Booth Tarkington

“ George almost shouted. “That's what I want to know!”
Lucy shook her head despairingly. “You are the queerest person! You say you're a man now, but you talk more like a boy than ever. What does make you so excited?”
“'Excited!'” he stormed. “Do you dare to stand there and call me 'excited'? I tell you, I never have been more calm or calmer in my life! I don't know that a person needs to be called 'excited' because he demands explanations that are his simple due!”
“What in the world do you want me to explain?”
“Your conduct with Fred Kinney!” George shouted.
Lucy uttered a sudden cry of laughter ”

“ George turned pale.
“Eat your dinner, Georgie,” his aunt said sweetly. “Food will do you good. I didn't say I knew this rumour was true. I only said I'd heard it.”
“When? When did you hear it!”
“Oh, months ago!” And Fanny found any further postponement of laughter impossible.
“Fanny, you're a hard-hearted creature,” Isabel said gently. “You really are. Don't pay any attention to her, George. Fred Kinney's only a clerk in his uncle's hardware place: he couldn't marry for ages—even if anybody would accept him!” ”

“ You usually hear pretty much everything that goes on around the nooks and crannies in this town, I hear. What's the last from the gossips' corner, auntie?”
Fanny dropped her eyes, and the spark was concealed, but a movement of her lower lip betokened a tendency to laugh, as she replied. “There hasn't been much gossip lately, except the report that Lucy Morgan and Fred Kinney are engaged—and that's quite old, by this time.”
Undeniably, this bit of mischief was entirely successful, for there was a clatter upon George's plate. “What—what do you think you're talking about?” he gasped. ”