I can't help it! When I think of
all I've gone through with you off in the Green-glades or the
Never-glades or whatever they are--and worrying all the time about your
scalp and alligators--and you sitting there so peaceful, Diane, with
your hair still on--I've got to cry--I just have and I will. And
Carl's mysteriously disappeared--Heaven knows where! I've not seen him
for weeks. Nor did he condescend to write me--as I must say you
did--and very good of you too!" Whether Aunt Agatha was crying because
her mother was stout and eruptively lachrymose, or because Diane's hair
was still where it belonged, or because Carl was missing, Diane could
not be sure.
Aunt Agatha puffed presently to a seat by the fire, with hair and hat
awry, and dropped her hand bag.
"Johnny," she said severely, "don't stare so. I'm sorry of course that
I made you drop the kettle when I came, I am indeed, but I'm here and
there's the kettle--and that's all there is to it."
"Of course it is!" exclaimed Diane, kissing her heartily. "And I'm
mighty glad to see you, Aunt Agatha, tears and all!"
There was some little difficulty in persuading Aunt Agatha of the truth
of this, but she presently removed her hat, narrowly escaped dropping
it into the fire, and consigned it, along with the athletic hand bag,
to Johnny.
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