out that I was on paternally
familiar terms with the entire neighborhood of maidens of
reasonably tender years, and a very important factor in young
feminine councils. These artful creatures knew exactly when
their favorite roses were in bloom, exactly when the cherries
back of the house were ripe, exactly when it was time to go to
town for another theatre party, to give a picnic up the river, or
a small and informal dance in the parlors. I was expected to
remember and observe all birthdays, to be a well-spring of
benevolence at Christmas, and a free and never-failing florist at
Easter. I was the recipient of all young griefs and troubles, and
no girl ever committed herself unconditionally to the arms of her
lover until she had talked the matter over with Uncle John. All
this, to a good-looking man of--well, considerably over forty,
was flattering, but no sinecure.

One morning, in the late spring, it came over me unhappily that
in a moment of fatal forgetfulness I had promised to be present
that evening at a card-party--a promise exacted by the "Rogers
woman," _persona non grata_ to Prudence. A card-party was to me
in the category with battle and murder and sudden death, from
which we all petition to be delivered in the book of common
prayer--but how to be delivered? I could not be called suddenly
to town, for I had already run that excuse to its full limit. I
could not conveniently start for Europe on an hour's notice. The
plea of sickness I dismissed as feminine and unworthy. And while
I sat debating to what extreme I could tax my over-burdened
conscience, Malachy appeared with the information that he had
discovered unmistakable signs of cutworms in the rose-bushes, and
that the local custodians of the trees were thundering against an
impending epidemic of brown-tailed moth. Surely my path of duty
led to the garden. But that card-party? No, let the cutworm work
his will, and let the brown-tailed moth corrupt; I must take
refuge in flight, however inglorious. It was then that the good
angel, who never forsakes a well-meaning man, whispered to me
that far back in a quiet corner of New England was the little
village where I had passed my boyhood, which I had deserted for
five and twenty years, but which still remembered me as "Johnny"
Stanhope, thanks to the officious longevity of the editor of the
county paper.

The situation I explained briefly to Prudence and Malachy, and
swore them into the conspiracy. I threw