ct Rebecca
Mary's little cookbook diary. Should she not know--ought she not to know
the thoughts that were brewing in the child's mind? How else could she
bring her up properly?

"Read it," Duty said, "find out. Are you afraid?"

"I'm ashamed," groaned Aunt Olivia. "Do you think Rebecca Mary would
read my diary?"

"Is Rebecca Mary bringing you up?"

Aunt Olivia sometimes thought so. The puzzle that she had begun to try
to solve when Rebecca Mary's white, death-struck mother had laid her
baby in Aunt Olivia's unaccustomed arms was getting a little more
difficult every day. Some days Aunt Olivia wondered if she ought to give
it up. Oh, this bringing up--this bringing up of little children!

"If I must," groaned Aunt Olivia, and got as far as taking the little
diary in her hands. But she got no farther. She laid it gently down
again.

"I can't," she said, firmly, but she could not look Duty in the face as
she said it. She had always listened to Duty before.

"You know you ought to--"

"Yes, I know, but I can't! It seems a shameful thing to do. I'm sure
I've tried often enough--you know I've tried--"

"I know--that was good practice. Now stop trying and read it!"

Aunt Olivia flamed up. "I tell you I won't! It's a shameful thing. If
I found Rebecca Mary reading one of my diaries, I should send her to
bed--"

"Read hers and go to bed yourself. It's your duty to read it. When you
bring up a child--"

"I never will again!"

Aunt Olivia read it, with the relentless grip of Duty holding her to the
task. But flame spots crept up through the sallow of her thin cheeks and
made what atonement they could.

It did not take long, though some of the pages she read twice. The
weatherless week, when Rebecca Mary had put off her "asking" from day to
day, Aunt Olivia went back to the third time. When she closed the little
book it was not a Plummer face she lifted it to and laid it against for
the space of a breath--a Plummer face would not have been wet.

Then she Whirled upon Duty. "Well, I've done it--I hope you're
satisfied!"

"It had to be done," calm Duty responded. "If you think it will make you
feel any better, you can send yourself to bed."

"I'm going to," sighed Aunt Olivia, slipping away to her room. A strange
little yearning was upon her to hunt up Rebecca Mary and call her
darling and dear. But in her heart she knew she should not have the
courage to do it. Here was another Plummer coward!

"Why are som