?"

"Indeed, I haven't the slightest idea, but I have very little doubt
that he does--he plays tennis so beautifully. He is going to teach
Gertrude, in the spring." She stopped, and again held the scarf up to
the light. "I am so glad that my girly, that was so naughty once and
ran away with you--I don't think I shall _ever_ get over the awful
fright I had that night!--I am so glad that, now she is growing up,
clever people like Dr. Doyle appreciate her so much, so very much."

She dropped her crochet to her lap and stared squarely at Carl. Her
warning that he would do exceedingly well to go home was more than
plain. He stared back, agitated but not surrendering. Deliberately,
almost suavely, with ten years of experience added to the sixteen
years that he had brought into the room, he said:

"I'll see if they'd like to play." He sauntered to the other end of
the room, abashed before the mystic woman, and ventured: "I saw Ray,
to-day.... I got to be going, pretty quick, but I was wondering if you
two felt like playing some crokinole?"

Gertie said, slowly: "I'd like to, Carl, but----Unless you'd like to
play, doctor?"

"Why of course it's _comme il faut_ to play, Miss Cowles, but I was
just hoping to have the pleasure of hearing you make some more of your
delectable music," bowed the dentist, and Gertie bowed back; and their
smiles joined in a glittery bridge of social aplomb.

"Oh yes," from Carl, "that--yes, do----But you hadn't ought to play
too much if you haven't been well."

"Oh, Carl!" shrieked Gertie. "'Ought not to,' not 'hadn't ought to'!"

"'Ought not to,'" repeated Mrs. Cowles, icily, while the dentist waved
his hand in an amused manner and contributed:

"Ought not to say 'hadn't ought to,' as my preceptor used to tell
me.... I'd like to hear you sing Longfellow's 'Psalm of Life,' Miss
Cowles."

"Don't you think Longfellow's a bum poet?" growled Carl. "Bone
Stillman says Longfellow's the grind-organ of poetry. Like this: 'Life
is re-al, life is ear-nest, tum te diddle dydle dum!'"

"Carl," ordered Mrs. Cowles, "you will please to never mention that
Stillman person in my house!"

"Oh, Carl!" rebuked Gertie. She rose from the piano-stool. Her essence
of virginal femininity, its pure and cloistered and white-camisoled
odor, bespelled Carl to fainting timidity. And while he was thus
defenseless the dentist thrust:

"Why, they tell me Stillman doesn't even believe the Bible!"

Carl was not to retr