his mouth to reply. He wanted to reply very much, but
somehow he couldn't find a satisfying answer to that question.

"Ma'am," he said, "all I can say is that if you'd been in South America,
same as I have, and seen the way them half-breed young ones act,
you'd--"

The teacher smiled, in spite of an apparent effort not to.

"Perhaps so," she said, "but this is Massachusetts. And--well, Emily
isn't a half-breed."

Captain Cy strode through the vestibule. Just before the door closed
behind him he heard a stifled sob from poor Bos'n.

The Board of Strategy was waiting at the end of the yard. Its members
were filled with curiosity.

"Did you give it to her good?" demanded Asaph. "Did you let her
understand we wouldn't put up with such cruelizin'?"

"Where's Bos'n?" asked Mr. Bangs.

Their friend's answers were brief and tantalizingly incomplete. He
walked homeward at a gait which caused plump little Bailey to puff
in his efforts to keep up, and he would say almost nothing about the
interview in the schoolroom.

"Well," said Mr. Tidditt, when they reached the Whittaker gate, "I guess
she knows her place now; hey, Cy? I cal'late she'll be careful who she
keeps after school from now on."

"Didn't use no profane language, did you, Cy?" asked Bailey. "I hope
not, 'cause she might have you took up just out of spite. Did she ask
your pardon for her actions?"

"No!" roared the captain savagely. Then, banging the gate behind him, he
strode up the yard and into the house.

Bos'n came home a half hour later. Captain Cy was alone in the sitting
room, seated in his favorite rocker and moodily staring at nothing in
particular. The girl gazed at him for a moment and then climbed into his
lap.

"I wrote my fifty lines, Uncle Cyrus," she said. "Teacher said I'd done
them very nicely, too."

The captain grunted.

"Uncle Cy," whispered Bos'n, putting her arms around his neck, "I'm
awful sorry I was so bad."

"Bad? Who--you? You couldn't be bad if you wanted to. Don't talk that
way or I'll say somethin' I hadn't ought to."

"Yes, I could be bad, too. I was bad. I whispered."

"Whispered! What of it? That ain't nothin'. When I was a young one in
school I used to whis-- . . . Hum! Well, anyhow, don't you think any
more about it. 'Tain't worth while."

They rocked quietly for a time. Then Bos'n said:

"Uncle Cyrus, don't you like teacher?"

"Hey? LIKE her? Well, if that ain't a question? Yes, I like her about as
well