chen.

No one was there, as Phil's first glance satisfied him, and he was
disposed to hope that Mrs. Brent--he never called her mother--was out,
but a thin, acid, measured voice from the sitting-room adjoining soon
satisfied him that there was to be no reprieve.

"Philip Brent, come here!"

Phil entered the sitting-room.

In a rocking-chair by the fire sat a thin woman, with a sharp visage,
cold eyes and firmly compressed lips, to whom no child would voluntarily
draw near.

On a sofa lay outstretched the hulking form of Jonas, with whom he had
had his little difficulty.

"I am here, Mrs. Brent," said Philip manfully.

"Philip Brent," said Mrs. Brent acidly, "are you not ashamed to look me
in the face?"

"I don't know why I should be," said Philip, bracing himself up for the
attack.

"You see on the sofa the victim of your brutality," continued Mrs.
Brent, pointing to the recumbent figure of her son Jonas.

Jonas, as if to emphasize these words, uttered a half groan.

Philip could not help smiling, for to him it seemed ridiculous.

"You laugh," said his step-mother sharply. "I am not surprised at it.
You delight in your brutality."

"I suppose you mean that I have treated Jonas brutally."

"I see you confess it."

"No, Mrs. Brent, I do not confess it. The brutality you speak of was all
on the side of Jonas."

"No doubt," retorted Mrs. Brent, with sarcasm.

"It's the case of the wolf and the lamb over again."

"I don't think Jonas has represented the matter to you as it happened,"
said Phil. "Did he tell you that he flung a snow-ball at my head as hard
as a lump of ice?"

"He said he threw a little snow at you playfully and you sprang upon him
like a tiger."

"There's a little mistake in that," said Phil. "The snow-ball was hard
enough to stun me if it had hit me a little higher. I wouldn't be hit
like that again for ten dollars."

"That ain't so! Don't believe him, mother!" said Jonas from the sofa.

"And what did you do?" demanded Mrs. Brent with a frown.

"I laid him down on the snow and washed his face with soft snow."

"You might have given him his death of cold," said Mrs. Brent, with
evident hostility. "I am not sure but the poor boy will have pneumonia
now, in consequence of your brutal treatment."

"And you have nothing to say as to his attack upon me?" said Phil
indignantly.

"I have no doubt you have very much exaggerated it."

"Yes, he has," chimed in Jonas from the sofa.