did."

"No you are not--" said Mr. Linden gravely,--"people are never blessed
who do not speak truth. And you have shut both doors by which such a
blessing might have come in this case, Phil."

"Who said I ever said so, sir?" Phil asked confidently.

"You told Dr. Harrison, for one," said Mr. Linden.

"I never spoke a word to Dr. Harrison--" Phil began and checked
himself. "I never said anything but the truth, sir!"

"What truth did you say to him?" said Mr. Linden. "I wish you would do
the same for me. The roughest truth, Phil, is pleasanter to ray ears
than the smoothest falsehood."

"I said nothin' but what _was_ truth, sir," said Phil, perplexedly, as
if he felt caught in a snare. "I didn't think you meant _that_."

"That is precisely what I meant."

"'Twarn't nothing but the truth, sir."

"Well--" said Mr. Linden,--"I never was afraid of the truth yet, and I
don't mean to begin now. You didn't say I had cut your ears off, did
you Phil?"

"I didn't say nothin' about you, sir, good or indifferent."

"That's something," said Mr. Linden with unmoved gravity. "What else
did you say?"

"It was down to Neanticut, sir," said Phil--"I told Reuben Taylor as
how he'd druv her down, Joe Deacon said he had; and Reuben said Joe had
made a mistake. That's the hull of it, sir."

"Who is _her?_" said Mr. Linden.

"She--Miss Faith Derrick, sir."

Phil was getting very uncomfortably red in the face.

"Well why did you tell Miss Derrick that Reuben didn't drive her
down?--would not she have been likely to know."

"I didn't, sir."

"I thought not. What _did_ you tell her?"

"She knows what I told her!"--said Phil, looking abstractedly at the
corner of the couch on which Mr. Linden lay.--"I don't know as I can
recollect. But that's what Reuben said, sir."

"Well tell me as near as you can recollect--" said Mr. Linden. "And
also just the words you used to Reuben."

Phil took time to reflect.

"I don't want ter," he said.

"No, I see you don't--but I want to hear them," said Mr. Linden very
quietly. "But tell me the truth _this_ time, Phil."

"Folks has a right to speak," said Phil, stating a broad
proposition,--"but they hain't a right to tell all they say!"

"Well?"--said Mr. Linden, waiving that.

"'Twarn't nothin'!" said Phil--"and it 'll just make folks mad--and I
durstn't--"

"Dare not repeat what you have dared to say? how is that, Phil? But my
forgiveness always meets confession half way, as yo