to put up with it—more by token that you’re full of it yourself, you know. Talk about your not being Murray! The Starr is only skin deep with you.”
“It isn’t—I’m all Starr—I want to be,” cried Emily. “And, oh, how can I choose between Mike and Saucy Sal?”
This was indeed a problem. Emily wrestled with it all day, her heart bursting. She liked Mike best—there was no doubt of that; but she couldn’t leave Saucy Sal to Ellen’s tender mercies. Ellen had always hated Sal; but she rather liked Mike and she would be good to him. Ellen was going back to her own little house in Maywood village and she wanted a cat. At last in the evening, Emily made her bitter decision. She would take Saucy Sal.
“Better take the Tom,” said Cousin Jimmy. “Not so much bother with kittens you know, Emily.”
“Jimmy!” said Aunt Elizabeth sternly. Emily wondered over the sternness. Why weren’t kittens to be spoken of? But she didn’t like to hear Mike called “the Tom.” It sounded insulting, someway.
And she didn’t like the bustle and commotion of packing up. She longed for the old quiet and the sweet, remembered talks with her father. She felt as if he had been thrust far away from her by this influx of Murrays.
“What’s this?” said Aunt Elizabeth suddenly, pausing for a moment in her packing. Emily looked up and saw with dismay that Aunt Elizabeth had in her hands the old account book—that she was opening it—that she was reading in it. Emily sprang across the floor and snatched the book.
“You mustn’t read that, Aunt Elizabeth,” she cried indignantly, “that’s mine,—my own private property.”
“Hoity-toity, Miss Starr,” said Aunt Elizabeth, staring at her, “let me tell you that I have a right to read your books. I am responsible for you now. I am not going to have anything hidden or underhanded, under-
