The Story Girl had originated the idea one evening in the rustling , rain-wet ways of the spruce wood , where we were picking gum after a day of showers . When we had picked enough , we sat down on the moss-grown stones at the end of a long arcade , where it opened out on the harvest-golden valley below us , our jaws exercising themselves vigorously on the spoil of our climbings . We were never allowed to chew gum in school or in company , but in wood and field , orchard and hayloft , such rules were in abeyance . `` My Aunt Jane used to say it was n't polite to chew gum anywhere , '' said Peter rather ruefully . `` I do n't suppose your Aunt Jane knew all the rules of etiquette , '' said Felicity , designing to crush Peter with a big word , borrowed from the Family Guide . But Peter was not to be so crushed . He had in him a certain toughness of fibre , that would have been proof against a whole dictionary . `` She did , too , '' he retorted . `` My Aunt Jane was a real lady , even if she was only a Craig . She knew all those rules and she kept them when there was nobody round to see her , just the same as when any one was . And she was smart . If father had had half her git-up-and-git I would n't be a hired boy to-day . '' `` Have you any idea where your father is ? '' asked Dan . `` No , '' said Peter indifferently . `` The last we heard of him he was in the Maine lumber woods . But that was three years ago . I do n't know where he is now , and , '' added Peter deliberately , taking his gum from his mouth to make his statement more impressive , `` I do n't care . '' `` Oh , Peter , that sounds dreadful , '' said Cecily . `` Your own father ! ''
`` Well , '' said Peter defiantly , `` XXXXX your own father had run away when you was a baby , and left your mother to earn her living by washing and working out , I guess you would n't care much about him either . ''
against as at below from if in of on to