"I hate to be beholden to anybody.

We're as good as any of them anyway." The bitterness in his tone mystified her still more.
It was little Jane who supplied the key to the mystery.

"I don't think he likes Tom very much," said the little girl.

"He likes Hazel, though.
But he might have come to our house; I did not laugh." And then the mother thought she understood.
That sudden intensity of bitterness in her boy's voice startled her a little, but deep down in her heart she was conscious of a queer feeling of satisfaction, almost of pride.

"He's just like his father," she said to herself.