I
haven't read that either."
"And which of them all do you like the best?"
"I don't know," said Fleda,--"I don't know but I like to read the
Encyclopaedia as well as any of them. And then I have the newspapers to
read too."
"I think, Miss Fleda," said Mr. Carleton a minute after, "you had
better let me take you with my mother over the sea, when we go back
again,--to Paris."
"Why, sir?"
"You know," said he half smiling, "your aunt wants you, and has engaged my
mother to bring you with her if she can."
"I know it," said Fleda. "But I am not going."
It was spoken not rudely but in a tone of quiet determination.
"Aren't you too tired, sir?" said she gently, when she saw Mr. Carleton
preparing to launch into the remaining hickory trees.
"Not I!" said he. "I am not tired till I have done, Fairy. And besides,
cheese is workingman's fare, you know, isn't it?"
"No," said Fleda gravely,--"I don't think it is."
"What then?" said Mr. Carleton, stopping as he was about to spring into
the tree, and looking at her with a face of comical amusement.
"It isn't what _our_ men live on," said Fleda, demurely eying the fallen
nuts, with a head full of business.
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