it was, I think you ought to give Gammire to me because I
_like_ Noble Dill, and I----"

But here her aunt laughed again and looked at her with some curiosity.
"You still do?" she asked. "What for?"

"Well," said Florence, swallowing, "he may be rather smallish for a man,
but he's very uncouth and distingrished-looking, and I think he doesn't
get to enjoy himself much. Grandpa talks about him so torrably
and--and----" Here, such was the unexpected depth of her feeling that
she choked, whereupon her aunt, overcome with laughter, but nevertheless
somewhat touched, sprang up and threw two pretty arms about her
charmingly.

"You _funny_ Florence!" she cried.

"Then will you give me Gammire?" Florence asked instantly.

"No. We'll bring him in the house now, and you can stay for lunch."

Florence was imperfectly consoled, but she had a thought that brightened
her a little.

"Well, there'll be an awful time when grandpa comes home this
afternoon--but it certainly will be inter'sting!"

She proved a true prophet, at least to the extent that when Mr. Atwater
opened his front gate that afternoon he was already in the presence of a
deeply interested audience whose observation was unknown to him. Through
the interstices of the lace curtains at an open window, the gaze of
Julia and Florence was concentrated upon him in a manner that might have
disquieted even so opinionated and peculiar a man as Mr. Atwater, had he
been aware of it; and Herbert likewise watched him fixedly from an
unseen outpost. Herbert had shown some recklessness, declaring loudly
that he intended to lounge in full view; but when the well-known form of
the ancestor was actually identified, coming up the street out of the
distance, the descendant changed his mind. The good green earth ceased
to seem secure; and Herbert climbed a tree. He surrounded himself with
the deepest foliage; and beneath him some outlying foothills of Kitty
Silver were visible, where she endeavoured to lurk in the concealment of
a lilac bush.

Gammire was the only person in view. He sat just in the middle of the
top step of the veranda, and his air was that of an endowed and settled
institution. What passing traffic there was interested him but vaguely,
not affecting the world to which he belonged--that world being this
house and yard, of which he felt himself now, beyond all question, the
official dog.

It had been a rather hard-working afternoon, for he had done everything
sug