't got any more right
to be picked on for that than a child."

"Yes," Henry admitted. "But if you go and tell 'em so, I bet she'd get
even with you some way that would probably get _me_ in trouble, too,
before we get through with the job. _I_ wouldn't tell 'em if I was you,
Herbert!"

"Well, I wasn't intending to," Herbert responded gloomily; and the
thought of each, unknown to the other, was the same, consisting of a
symbolic likeness of Wallie Torbin at his worst. "I _ought_ to tell on
Florence; by rights I ought," said Herbert; "but I've decided I won't.
There's no tellin' what she wouldn't do. Not that she could do anything
to _me_, particyourly----"

"Nor me, either," his friend interposed hurriedly. "I don't worry about
anything like that! Still, if I was you I wouldn't tell. She's only a
girl, we got to remember."

"Yes," said Herbert. "That's the way _I_ look at it, Henry; and the way
I look at it is just simply this: long as she _is_ a girl, why, simply
let her go. You can't tell what she'd do, and so what's the use to go
and tell on a girl?"

"That's the way _I_ look at it," Henry agreed. "What's the use? If I was
in your place, I'd act just the same way you do."

"Well," said Herbert, "I guess I better go on in the house, Henry. It's
a good while after dark."

"You're makin' a big mistake!" Henry Rooter called after him. "_You_
won't see any apple dumplings, I bet a hunderd dollars! You better come
on home with me."

Herbert no more than half opened his front door before he perceived that
his friend's advice had been excellent. So clearly Herbert perceived
this, that he impulsively decided not to open the door any farther, but
on the contrary to close it and retire; and he would have done so, had
his mother not reached forth and detained him. She was, in fact, just
inside that door, standing in the hall with one of his great-aunts, one
of his aunts, two aunts-by-marriage, and an elderly unmarried cousin,
who were all just on the point of leaving. However, they changed their
minds and decided to remain, now that Herbert was among them.

The captive's father joined them, a few minutes later, but it had
already become clear to Herbert that _The North End Daily Oriole_ was in
one sense a thing of the past, though in another sense this former owner
and proprietor was certain that he would never hear the last of it.
However, on account of the life of blackmail and slavery now led by the
members of the o