"I cannot stand it any longer," she sobbed. Her old face was
quivering, there was a bright red spot on each cheek, and her
side-curls were trembling with excitement. "I have put up with that
little beast until I can endure it no longer. Patience has ceased to
be a virtue. Either it must go, or I shall. Look at Dick! His heart is
beating itself almost out of his poor little body, he is so
frightened. And there's that china dragon, that has been a family
heirloom for generations,--all broken! And my precious little
keepsakes, that I have cherished since childhood, all scattered or
lost! Oh, Tom, you do not know how cruelly it hurts me!"
I felt sorry, then. I wanted to cry out, as Stuart had done when he
shot his great-great-grandfather's portrait, "Oh, Aunt Patricia, I'm
_so_ sorry! It was an accident. I didn't mean to do it, truly I didn't
mean to!" But she couldn't understand monkey language, and man's
speech has been denied us, so I only hugged the limb closer and
watched in silence.
I stayed in that tree all day. The boys came home from school, and
called and called me, but I kept as still as a mouse. It was not until
long after dark that I crawled up the lightning-rod and slipped
through the window into my room in the attic. Phil found me there the
next morning when he began his search again. He squeezed me until I
ached, he was so glad to see me.
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