Lin hesitated.
"You did know!" she exclaimed, but lost her resentment at once, and continued, very quietly and with a friendly tone, "I reckon you don't like to have to tell folks bad news."
It was I that now hesitated.
"Not to a strange girl, anyway!" said she. "Well, now I have good news to tell you. You would not have given me any shock if you had said you knew about poor Nate, for that's the reason--Of course those things can't be secrets! Why, he's only twenty, sir! How should he know about this world? He hadn't learned the first little thing when he left home five years ago. And I am twenty-three--old enough to be Nate's grandmother, he's that young and thoughtless. He couldn't ever realize bad companions when they came around. See that!" She showed me a paper, taking it out like
