"Well, you needn't throw that in my face; I'm not to blame for bein'
unselfish. I've just had to be, whether I wanted or not. It's my
misfortune, not my fault. Lots of people are unselfish because they're
too weak to stand up for their own rights." She paused--and then
looked up at him, smiling whimsically, and added: "Well, well,
Jonathan; see here now--I'll think it over, and perhaps some day
before--_go 'way_, you horrid thing! Let go my hand, I tell you.
There! You've made me drop a whole row of stitches. If you don't run
over home right now, before you're tempted to do any more flirtin,
I'll--I'll hold you for breach of promise."

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XV

NICKEY'S SOCIAL AMBITIONS

To Nickey, the Maxwells were in the nature of a revelation. At his
impressionable stage of boyhood, and because of their freedom from
airs and graces of any kind, he was quick to notice the difference in
type--"some class to them; not snobs or dudes, but the real thing," as
he expressed it. His ardent admiration of Donald, and his adoration of
Mrs. Betty, gave him ambition to find the key to their secret, and to
partake of it.

He was too shy to speak of it,--to his mother last of all, as is the
nature of a boy,--and had to rely on an observant and receptive mind
for the earlier steps in his quest. When Maxwell boarded with them,
Nickey had discovered that he was won't to exercise with dumb-bells
each morning before breakfast. The very keenness of his desire to be
initiated, held him silent. A visit to the town library, on his
mother's behalf, chanced to bring his eyes--generally oblivious of
everything in the shape of a book--upon the title of a certain volume
designed to instruct in various parlor-feats of physical prowess.

The book was borrowed from the librarian,--a little shamefacedly. The
next morning Mrs. Burke was somewhat alarmed at the noise which came
from Nickey's room, and when there was a crash as if the chimney had
fallen, she could stand it no longer, and hurried aloft. Nickey stood
in the middle of the floor, clad in swimming trunks, gripping a large
weight (purloined from the barn) in either hand, very red in the face,
and much out of breath.

As the door unexpectedly opened he dived for bed and pulled the
clothes under his chin.

"Land Sakes!" Hepsey breathed, aghast. "What's all this about? If
there's a nail loose in the flooring I can lend you a hammer for the
asking," and she examined seve