“I know the cause of thy displeasure,” declared Dan.  “Gran’ther Wattles poked thee for bouncing about during the sermon last Sunday.  But it is unseemly to bounce in the meeting-house, and besides, is he not the tithing-man?  ’T is his duty to see that people behave as they should.”

“He would mayhap have bounced himself if a bee had been buzzing about his nose as it did about mine,” said Nancy, and, giving a vicious dab at the pictured features, she drew a bee perched on the end of Gran’ther Wattles’s nose.  “Here now are all the gray hairs he hath,” she added, making three little scratches above the ear.

“Nancy Pepperell!” cried her brother, aghast, “dost thou not remember what happened to the forty and two children that said ’Go up, thou bald head’ to Elijah?  It would be no marvel if bears were to come out of the woods this moment to eat thee up!”

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“’T was n’t Elijah, ’t was Elisha,” Nancy retorted with spirit, “but it matters little whether ‘t was one or t’ other, for I don’t believe two bears could possibly hold so much, and besides dost thou not think it a deal worse to cause a bear to eat up forty and two children than to say ’Go up, thou bald head’?”

“Nancy!” exclaimed her horrified brother, glancing fearfully toward the forest and clapping his hand on her mouth to prevent further impiety, “thou art a wicked, wicked girl!  Dost thou not know that the eye of the Lord is in every place?  Without doubt his ear is too, and He can hear every word thy saucy tongue sayeth.  Come, let us rub out this naughty picture quickly, and mayhap God will take no notice this time.”  He ran across Gran’ther Wattles’s portrait from brow to chin, covering it with foot-prints.  “Besides,” he went on as he trotted back and forth, “thou hast broken a commandment!  Thou hast made a likeness of something that ’s in the earth, and that ’s Gran’ther Wattles!  Nancy, thou dost take fearful chances with thy soul.”

Nancy began to look a little anxious as she considered her conduct.  “At any rate,” she said defensively, “it is n’t a graven image, and I have neither bowed down to it nor served it!  I do try to be good, Dan, but it seemeth that the devil is ever at my elbow.”

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“’T is because thou art idle,” said Dan, shaking his head as gravely as Gran’ther Wattles himself.  “Busy thyself with the clams, and Satan will have less chance at thy idle hands, and thy idle tongue too.”

Nancy obediently took hold of the basket which Dan thrust into her hands, and together they walked for some distance over the sandy stretches.  Suddenly a tiny stream of water spouted up beside Dan’s feet.  “Here they be!” he shouted, plunging his shovel into the sand, “and what big ones!” Nancy surveyed the clams with disfavor.  They were thrusting pale thick muscles out between the lobes of their shells.  “They look as if they were sticking out their tongues at us,” said Nancy as she picked one up gingerly and dropped it into the basket.  “But, Dan, Mother said we were to bed them in seaweed!”