"I couldn't have helped it, Robert," she said. "Not if you'd been
there preaching 'Thou shalt not' to me! You would have looked
too, while you were preaching. You can't imagine, sitting there
at that desk, what the temptation was--Robert, you don't suppose
Rebecca Mary has gone crazy?"
"Felicia! You frighten me!"
"No, _I_ don't suppose either. But it was certainly very strange.
It was almost ALARMING, Robert. And she didn't know how at all. I
wanted to go down and show her!"
"It seems to me"--the minister spoke impressively "that it is not
Rebecca Mary who has gone crazy--"
"Why, the idea! Haven't I made it plain?" laughed she. "I'll
speak in A B C's then. Rebecca Mary was SKIPPING, Robert -
skipping skipping."
"Then it's Rebecca Mary," the minister murmured.
"That's what I'm afraid--didn't I say so? Or else it's her second
childhood--"
"First, you mean. If THAT'S it, don't let's say a word, dear--
don't breathe, Felicia, for fear we'll stop it."
"Dear child!" the minister's wife said, tenderly. "I wish I'd
gone down there and shown her how. And I'd have told her--Robert,
I'd have told her how to climb a tree! Don't tell the parish."
The day was to end at sunset, from sunrise to sunset, Rebecca
Mary had decreed. The last article on her crumpled little
programme was, "Saying Good-by to Olivicia(Don't cry).
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