the same day, and the same hour of the day! That's what
strikes _me_ so forcibly!" She glanced at the fatter and more silent
sister, whose chief function in life seemed to be to support the family
opinion, and who meekly responded--

"And me too, sister!"

"Those are not _independent_ coincidences----" Mad Mathesis was just
beginning, when Clara ventured to interpose.

"There's no jolting here," she pleaded meekly. "_Would_ you mind writing
it down now?"

Out came the ivory tablets once more. "What was it, then?" said her
aunt.

"One glass of lemonade, one sandwich, one biscuit--Oh dear me!" cried
poor Clara, the historical tone suddenly changing to a wail of agony.

"Toothache?" said her aunt calmly, as she wrote down the items. The two
sisters instantly opened their reticules and produced two different
remedies for neuralgia, each marked "unequalled."

"It isn't that!" said poor Clara. "Thank you very much. It's only that I
_can't_ remember how much I paid!"

"Well, try and make it out, then," said her aunt. "You've got
yesterday's luncheon to help you, you know. And here's the luncheon we
had the day before--the first day we went to that shop--_one
glass lemonade_, _four sandwiches_, _ten biscuits_. _Total,
one-and-fivepence._" She handed the tablets to Clara, who gazed at them
with eyes so dim with tears that she did not at first notice that she
was holding them upside down.

The two sisters had been listening to all this with the deepest
interest, and at this juncture the smaller one softly laid her hand on
Clara's arm.

"Do you know, my dear," she said coaxingly, "my sister and I are in the
very same predicament! Quite identically the very same predicament!
Aren't we, sister?"

"Quite identically and absolutely the very----" began the fatter sister,
but she was constructing her sentence on too large a scale, and the
little one would not wait for her to finish it.

"Yes, my dear," she resumed; "we were lunching at the very same shop as
you were--and we had two glasses of lemonade and three sandwiches and
five biscuits--and neither of us has the least idea what we paid. Have
we, sister?"

"Quite identically and absolutely----" murmured the other, who evidently
considered that she was now a whole sentence in arrears, and that she
ought to discharge one obligation before contracting any fresh
liabilities; but the little lady broke in again, and she retired from
the conversation a bankrupt.

"_Woul