reached out his hand he knew just how the hand that
he touched would feel, cool and firm, like that flame. Cool and silent.

There must have been something, somewhere, to make him remember....

He remembered.

A minute later Oliver had splashed up to them, shouting "A rescue! A
rescue! Guests Drown While Host Looks On Smilingly! What's the matter,
Ted, you look as if you wanted to turn into a submarine? Got cramp?"

IX

Mrs. Crowe relaxed a little for the first tired minute of her day.
Sunday dinner was nearly over, and though, in one way, the best meal in
the week for her because all her children were sure to be at home,
it was apt to be pure purgatory on a hot day, with Sheba dawdling and
grumbling and Rosalind spilling pea-soup on her Sunday dress, and
Aunt Elsie's deafness increased by the weather to the point of mild
imbecility.

She had been a little afraid today, especially with two guests and the
grandchildren rampant after church, and the extra leaf in the table that
squeezed Colonel Crowe almost into the sideboard and herself nearly out
of the window and made the serving of a meal a series of passings of
over-hot plates from hand to hand, exposed to the piracies of Jane
Ellen. But it had gone off better than she could have hoped. Colonel
Crowe had not absent-mindedly begun to serve vegetables with a teaspoon,
Aunt Elsie had not dissolved in tears and tottered away from the table
at some imagined rudeness of Dickie's, and Jane Ellen had not once had a
chance to take off her drawers.

"Ice tea!" said the avid voice of Jane Ellen in her ear. "Ice tea!"

Mrs. Crowe filled the glass and submitted a request for "please"
mechanically. She wondered, rather idly, if she would spend her time in
purgatory serving millions of Jane Ellens with iced tea.

"Ahem!" That was Colonel Crowe. "But you should have known us in the
days of our greatness, Mrs. Severance. When I was king of Estancia--"

"I'd rather have you like this, Colonel Crowe, really. I've always
wanted big families and never had one to live in--"

"Heard from Nancy recently, Oliver?" from Margaret, slightly satiric.

"Why yes, Margie, now and then. Not as often as you've heard from Stu
Winthrop probably but--"

"Motha, can I have some suga on my booberrish? Motha, can I have some
suga on my booberrish? Motha--_peesh!_"

"Oh, hush a minute, Rosalind dear. I don't know, Oliver. I'll speak
to Mr. Field about it if you like. I should think th