ch you are employed?"

"No," she said. "They ask me some things, and some things I have
mentioned to them, such as not having a gold pen."

"Very good," said I. "You should consider that defending yourself
against wasps is just as much your business here as anything else. If
you are stung, it is plain you can't write, and the interests of your
employer and of the House of Martha must suffer."

"Yes," she assented, still with the steady gaze of her blue eyes.

"Now your duty is clear," I went on. "If the sisters ask you if a wasp
flew into your room and tried to sting you, and you had to jump around
and kill it, and speak, before you could go on with your work, why, of
course you must tell them; but if they don't ask you, don't tell them.
It may seem ridiculous to you," I continued hurriedly, "to suppose that
they would ask such a question, but I put it in this way to show you the
principle of the thing."

She withdrew her eyes from my face, and fixed them upon the floor.

"The truth of the matter is," she said presently, "that I haven't done
anything wrong; at least I didn't intend to. I might have crouched down
in the corner, with my face to the wall, and have covered my head and
hands with my shawl, but I should have been obliged to stay there until
Sister Sarah came, and I should have been smothered to death; and
besides, I didn't think of it; so what I did do was the only thing I
could do, and I do not think I ought to be punished for it."

"Now it is settled," I said. "Your duty is to work here for the benefit
of your sisterhood, and you should not allow a wasp or any insect to
interfere with it."

She looked at me, and smiled a little abstractedly. Then she turned to
the table.

"I will go on with my work," she said, "and I will not say anything to
the sisters until I have given the matter most earnest and careful
consideration. I can do that a great deal better at home than I can
here."

It was very well that she stopped talking and applied herself to her
work, for I do not believe it was ten minutes afterward when Sister
Sarah unlocked the door, and came in to take her away.

XIV.

I FAVOR PERMANENCY IN OFFICE.

As soon as my secretary had gone I went into her room and looked for my
friend Vespa. I found him on the floor, quite dead, but not demolished.
Picking him up and carrying him to my study, I carefully gummed him to a
card. Under his motionless form I wrote, "The good services of t