satisfaction in depreciating her lack of foresight.

"I said from the first that we ought to have had a subject ready. It's
what always happens when you're unprepared. Now if we'd only got up
Xingu--"

The slowness of Mrs. Plinth's mental processes was always allowed for
by the club; but this instance of it was too much for Mrs. Ballinger's
equanimity.

"Xingu!" she scoffed. "Why, it was the fact of our knowing so much more
about it than she did--unprepared though we were--that made Osric Dane
so furious. I should have thought that was plain enough to everybody!"

This retort impressed even Mrs. Plinth, and Laura Glyde, moved by an
impulse of generosity, said: "Yes, we really ought to be grateful
to Mrs. Roby for introducing the topic. It may have made Osric Dane
furious, but at least it made her civil."

"I am glad we were able to show her," added Miss Van Vluyck, "that a
broad and up-to-date culture is not confined to the great intellectual
centres."

This increased the satisfaction of the other members, and they began
to forget their wrath against Osric Dane in the pleasure of having
contributed to her discomfiture.

Miss Van Vluyck thoughtfully rubbed her spectacles. "What surprised me
most," she continued, "was that Fanny Roby should be so up on Xingu."

This remark threw a slight chill on the company, but Mrs. Ballinger
said with an air of indulgent irony: "Mrs. Roby always has the knack of
making a little go a long way; still, we certainly owe her a debt for
happening to remember that she'd heard of Xingu." And this was felt by
the other members to be a graceful way of cancelling once for all the
club's obligation to Mrs. Roby.

Even Mrs. Leveret took courage to speed a timid shaft of irony. "I fancy
Osric Dane hardly expected to take a lesson in Xingu at Hillbridge!"

Mrs. Ballinger smiled. "When she asked me what we represented--do you
remember?--I wish I'd simply said we represented Xingu!"

All the ladies laughed appreciatively at this sally, except Mrs. Plinth,
who said, after a moment's deliberation: "I'm not sure it would have
been wise to do so."

Mrs. Ballinger, who was already beginning to feel as if she had
launched at Osric Dane the retort which had just occurred to her, turned
ironically on Mrs. Plinth. "May I ask why?" she enquired.

Mrs. Plinth looked grave. "Surely," she said, "I understood from Mrs.
Roby herself that the subject was one it was as well not to go into too
deeply?"