o pay his respects, you may bet 'tis
because he don't want to." Dinah, being vexed, spoke viciously.
Her speech implied that her mistress's conduct had been not only
indelicate but clumsy.

"You are a horrid woman," Mrs Bosenna accused her; "and I can't think
what put such nasty-minded thoughts into your head."

"No more can I, unless you suggested 'em," Dinah retorted.

"You were willing enough to come, when--when--"

"When you proposed it," Dinah relentlessly concluded the sentence.
"Of course. Why not?"

"And you were excited enough--you can't deny it"--her mistress insisted,
"when you brought the news this morning, that his ship had arrived.
But now, and only because you happen to be put out--"

"Who said I was put out?"

"As if I couldn't tell by your tone! Now, just because you happen to be
put out, I'm indelicate all of a sudden."

"I never said so," Dinah protested sullenly.

"_Said_ so?" Mrs Bosenna, rising, faced her with withering scorn.
"I hope you've a better sense of your position than to _say_ such a
thing. Oh, you content yourself with hinting! . . . But who owns this
house and garden, I should like to know?"

Dinah, though remorseful, showed fight yet. "Then why couldn' ye take
the bull by the horns an' march in by the front door?"

"Why? Because you agreed with me that to plant a two or three roses for
him would be a nice attention! . . . You can't start planting roses in
the dusk, at the end of an afternoon call; and, as it is, we've only
just finished before twilight."

Dinah was minded to retort that, as it was, the planting had taken a
long time. But she contented herself with glancing again at the house
and saying evasively that the new tenant appeared to take more interest
in fixtures than in flowers.

"I own," sighed Mrs Bosenna, "I thought he'd have been eager to take
stock of the garden before it grew dark. Such a beautiful garden, as it
is, in a small way!"

"When a man has passed his whole life at sea--"

"True," her mistress agreed. "Yet how it must enlarge the mind!
So different from farming!"

"It must be ekally dependent on the weather," Dinah opined. "At least.
More so, takin' one thing with another. Oh, decidedly. It stands to
reason."

"I'm romantic perhaps," confessed Mrs Bosenna; "but I can never think of
any ship's captain as being quite an ordinary man. The dangers he must
go through--and the foreign countries he visits--and up night after
night