This was too much for Cynthia. To be warned about the cellar stairs,
over which she gayly tripped at least a dozen times a day, was the
crowning joke of the performance. She sat down on the lowest step and
shouted with laughter. Jack, who was studying his thermometer, turned in
surprise.

It was too good. Cynthia tossed up her veil, and turned her crimson face
to her brother.

"Oh, Jack, Jack, I have you this time! Oh, oh, oh! I never dreamed you
would be so taken in!" And she danced up and down with glee.

Jack's first feeling was one of anger. How stupid he had been! Then his
sense of the ludicrous overcame him, and he joined in the mirth,
laughing until the tears rolled down his face.

"It's too good to be wasted," he said, as soon as he could speak. "Why
don't you go and see somebody? Go to those dear friends of Aunt
Betsey's, the Parkers."

"I will, I will!" cried Cynthia. "I'll go right away now. Jack, you can
drive me there."

"Oh no!" exclaimed Edith. "They would be sure to find you out, and it
would be all over town. You sha'n't do it, Cynthia."

"They'll never find me out. If Jack, my own twin brother, didn't, I'm
sure they wouldn't. I'm going! Hurry up, Jack, and harness the horse."

Jack went up the stairs like lightning, and was off to the barn. All
Edith's pleadings and expostulations were in vain. Cynthia could be very
determined when she pleased, and this time she had made up her mind to
pay no attention to the too-cautious Edith.

She waved farewell to her sister in exact imitation of Aunt Betsey's
gesture, and drove away by Jack's side in the old buggy.

They drew up at the Parkers' door, and Jack politely assisted "Aunt
Betsey" from the carriage. He ran up the steps and rang the bell for
her, and then, taking his place again in the buggy, he drove off to a
shady spot, and waited for his supposed aunt to reappear.

"Don't be too long," he had whispered at parting.

It seemed hours, but it was really only twenty minutes later, when the
front door opened, and the quaint little figure descended the steps amid
voluble good-byes.

"So glad to have seen you, my dear Miss Trinkett! I never saw you
looking so well or so young. You are a marvel. And you won't repeat that
little piece of news I told you, will you? You will probably hear it all
in good time. Good-by!"

It was a very quiet and depressed Aunt Betsey who got into the carriage
and drove away with Jack, very different from the gay l