all right, but look at _him_! Oh! Tommy, what a
terrible boy you are. And you promised me if I brought you, that
you----Just look at his clothes!"

"Look at _mine_!" says Mr. Browne. "My best hat is done for, and I'm
afraid to examine my trousers. _You_ might tell me if there is a big
rent anywhere. No? Eh? Well--if you won't I must only risk it. But I
feel tattered and torn. By-the-bye, Tommy, that's part of another old
story. I'll tell you about it some day."

"Come with me, Tommy," says his mother, with awful severity. She holds
out her hand to her son, who is still glaring at Dicky with an undying
ferocity. "You are a naughty boy, and I'm sure your father will be angry
with you when he hears of this."

"Oh, but he must not hear of it, must he, Tommy?" says Mr. Browne, with
decision, appealing to his late antagonist as airily, as utterly without
_arriere pensee_ as though no unpleasant passages have occurred between
them. "It's awfully good of you to desire our company, Mrs. Monkton, but
really on the whole I think----"

"It is Tommy I want," says Mrs. Monkton still with a meaning eye.

"Where Tommy goes, I go," says Mr. Browne, firmly. "We are wedded to
each other for the day. Nothing shall part us! Neither law nor order.
Just now we are going down to the lake to feed the swans with the
succulent bun. Will you come with us?"

"You are very uncertain, Dicky," says Mrs. Monkton, regarding Mr. Browne
with a gravity that savors of disapproval. "How shall I be sure that if
you take him to the lake you will not let him drown himself?"

"He is far more likely to drown me," says Mr. Browne. "Come along,
Tommy, the biscuits are in the hall, and the lake a quarter of a mile
away. The day waneth; let us haste--let us haste!"

"Where has Dicky gone?" asks Joyce, who has just returned victorious
from her game.

"To the lake with Tommy. I have been imploring him not to drown my son,"
says Mrs. Monkton with a rather rueful smile.

"Oh, he won't do that. Dicky is erratic, but pretty safe, for all that.
And he is fond of Tommy."

"He teases him, however, beyond endurance."

"That is because he _does_ like him."

"A strange conclusion to arrive at, surely," says Dysart, looking at
her.

"No. If he didn't like him, he wouldn't take the trouble," says she,
nonchalantly. She is evidently a little _distrait_. She looks as though
she wanted something.

"You won your game?" says her sister, smiling at her.

"Yes, quite