Heart-Throbs
and misery at having made such a little fool of myself, and given rise to such hurricanes of chatter. And, more than anything, at Charlie's misrepresenting the affair, as though it had been his doing, instead of the other way about. And as I was too proud and shy and hurt to contradict it, I was exposed to the worst thing of all—people being sorry for me, and old cats saying, "What a narrow squeak that poor, dear boy had!"
Then I began to have headaches and die away, till the doctors said I'd have to go on a sea voyage, or East on a visit to my aunt's. I wasn't so terribly, awfully, dreadfully, horribly sick, but I didn't eat much, and lay a lot on the sofa, and thought how nice it would be to have a runabout. This was an old fight between papa and me. I had wanted one for years, and he had objected to one for years; and now, at last, like Sindbad in the tunnel, I began to see gleams of daylight. What was the use of always rubbing in our big four-cylinder Dauntless? The manufacturers had
