a dozen bars without entangling herself in as many different keys.
What voice she had was not absolutely bad; but as she persisted in
singing in spite of Condy's guying, he put back his head and began a
mournful and lugubrious howling.

"Ho!" she exclaimed, grabbing the banjo from his knees, "if I can't
sing, I can play better than some smart people."

"Yes, by note," rallied Condy, as Travis executed a banjo "piece" of no
little intricacy. "That's just like a machine--like a hand-piano.

"Order in the gallery!" she retorted, without pausing in her playing.
She finished with a great flourish and gazed at him in triumph, only to
find him pretending a profound slumber. "O--o--o!" she remarked
between her teeth, "I just hate you, Condy Rivers."

"There are others," he returned airily.

"Talk about slang."

"NOW what will we do?" he cried. "Let's DO something. Suppose we
break something--just for fun."

Then suddenly the gayety went out of his face, and he started up and
clapped his hand to his head with a gasp of dismay. "Great Heavens!"
he exclaimed.

"Condy," cried Travis in alarm, "what is it"'

"The Tea!" he vociferated. "Laurie Flagg's Tea. I ought to be
there--right this minute."

Travis fetched a sigh of relief. "Is that all?"

"All!" he retorted. "All! Why, it's past four now--and I'd forgotten
every last thing." Then suddenly falling calm again, and quietly
resuming his seat: "I don't see as it makes any difference. I won't
go, that's all. Push those almonds here, will you, Miss Lady?--But we
aren't DOING anything," he exclaimed, with a brusque return of
exuberance. "Let's do things. What'll we do? Think of something. Is
there anything we can break?" Then, without any transition, he vaulted
upon the table and began to declaim, with tremendous gestures:

"There once was a beast called an Ounce,
Who went with a spring and a bounce.
His head was as flat
As the head of a cat,
This quadrupetantical Ounce,
---tical Ounce,
This quadrupetantical Ounce.

"You'd think from his name he was small,
But that was not like him at all.
He weighed, I'll be bound,
Three or four hundred pound,
And he looked most uncommonly tall,
--monly tall,
And he looked most uncommonly tall."

"Bravo! bravo!" cried Travis, pounding on the table. "Hear,
hear--none, Brutus, none."

Condy sat down on the table and swung his legs But during the ne