ich is unaccommodating?" asked Forester.

"He would not lend me his knife. I wanted to borrow his knife to cut
me a cane from some apple-tree trimmings, and he would not let me have
it."

"Haven't you got a knife of your own?" asked Forester.

"Yes," said Marco, "but mine won't open."

"Won't open?" repeated Forester. "What's the cause of that?"

"Why, I suppose because the joint is rusty," replied Marco.

"How came it rusty?" asked Forester.

"Why, you see I laid it down one day on a stone, where I was at work
with it, and left it there, and there happened to come a rain in the
night and rusted it. I did not know where it was, and so I didn't find
it for a good many days."

"Then, I presume," said Forester, "that James supposed that you would
leave his knife out in the same way and spoil it."

"No," replied Marco, "that was not the reason."

"You are sure that you asked him for it distinctly, and he refused?"

"Yes," said Marco.

Here there was a moment's pause. Marco thought that his cousin
Forester was considering what should be done to James, for being so
unaccommodating. He did not know but that he would report him to his
father and have him turned away; though Marco did not really wish to
have him turned away.

But Forester said, after reflecting a moment, "That makes me think of
a story I have got here; listen and hear it."

[Illustration: MARCO'S ROOM.]

So Forester took out his pocket-book and opened it, and then appeared
to be turning over the leaves, for a moment, to find a place. Then he
began to read, or to appear to read, as follows:

Once there was a little girl named Anne. She came to her mother one
day, as she was sitting in the parlor, and began to complain bitterly
of her sister Mary. Her sister Mary was older than she was, and had a
doll. Anne complained that Mary would not lend her her doll.

"Are you sure that she refused to lend you her doll?" asked her
mother.

"Yes, mother, I am _sure_ she did," replied Anne.

"Perhaps she is playing with it herself," said her mother.

"No," replied Anne, "she is ironing in the kitchen."

"I think you must be mistaken," said her mother. "Go and ask her
again. Don't tell her I sent you, but ask her yourself, whether she
really meant that she was not willing to lend you her doll."

So Anne ran off to put the question to Mary again; presently she
returned with the same answer. "Mary," she said, "would not lend it to
her."

"I am very s