"Yes."
"Right there, at the top--when Delia almost broke her neck more than
once going down those stairs only last winter, just because they're so
steep and narrow?"
Just nodded.
"And you fell on a banana skin once yourself, and wanted to thrash the
fellow who left it!"
Just's chin sank lower and lower.
Lanse eyed him a moment, struggling with a desire to seize the boy and
punish him tremendously. But as his quick wrath cooled a trifle in his
effort to control himself and act wisely, something about Just's brave
acknowledgment, where silence would have covered the whole thing,
appealed to him. The thought of the way the absent father and mother had
met every confession of his own that he could remember in a life of
prank-playing softened the words which came next to his lips.
"Well, it's pretty bad," he said, in a deep voice of regret. "I don't
wonder it breaks you up. Such a little thing to do so much mischief--and
so easy to have avoided it all. I reckon you'll take care of your banana
skins after this. But I like the way you own up, Just, and so will
Celia.
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