132 PEEP AT OUR NEIGHBORS.

saw me. She only guesses I did it.
How does she know? I will not own
it.*?

‘‘T haven’t eaten any melons behind
the blacksmith’s shop,” I said.

‘¢ But Captain Parry says he saw you
there with two or three other bad boys,
and that you was eating watermelons
with them.”

‘‘Well, if Captain Parry says so, he
lies, that’s all.”’

Amanda looked at me, and shook her
head, but made no reply.

I saw in a moment that I had made a
great mistake—that I had dulled, as the
farmers say when they hit a stone in