Says I to myself, something’s up; it ain’t natural for a girl to be in such a sweat about a Testament. So I give it a shake, and out drops a little piece of paper with ā€œ Half-Past Two ā€ wrote on it with a pencil. I ransacked it, but couldn’t find anything else. I couldn’t make anything out of that, so I put the paper in the book again, and when I got home and upstairs there was Miss Sophia in her door waiting for me. She pulled me in and shut the door; then she looked in the Testament till she found the paper, and as soon as she read it she looked glad; and before a body could think she grabbed me and give me a squeeze, and said I was the best boy in the world, and not to tell anybody. She was mighty red in the face for a minute, and her eyes lighted up, and it made her powerful pretty. I was a good deal astonished, but when I got my breath I asked her what the paper was about, and she asked me if I had read it, and I said no, and she asked me if I could read writing, and I told her ā€œno, only coarse-hand,ā€ and then she said the paper warn’t anything but a bookmark to keep her place, and I might go and play now.

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