o it
was settled.

By the time Kitty and Billy returned loiteringly from church Mr.
Fenelby had progressed pretty well through four of the sixteen
sections of the Sunday paper, and Mrs. Fenelby had Bobberts washed
and dressed and was in the kitchen preparing dinner, which on Sunday
was supposed to be at noon, but which, this Sunday, threatened to
be about two o'clock. Kitty threw off her hat and dropped her
umbrella in the hall and rushed for the kitchen. Billy merely
glanced into the parlor, and seeing Tom holding the grim funny page
uncompromisingly before his face, strolled out to the hammock.

"Laura," cried Kitty, "you _must_ let me help you! And what do you
think? We met Doctor Stafford, and he _did_ prescribe whisky and
rock candy for Bridget's cold! So I fixed everything all right. I
rushed Billy around to Bridget's sister's and Bridget is just
getting over her cold, so she was glad to come back to you. She
says she never, never drinks except under her doctor's orders, and
she said that if you hadn't been so hasty--"

Mrs. Fenelby dropped the potato she was slicing. Her pretty mouth
hardened.

"Kitty!" she exclaimed. "Now I shall _never_ forgive you! I will
_never_ have Bridget in this kitchen again! It wasn't only that she
drank, it was her awful, awful deceitfulness. It was that, Kitty,
more than anything else. I _won't_ have people about me who will not
live up to the tariff poor dear Tom worked and worried to make!
_You_ may smuggle, Kitty, if you must be so low, and I certainly
have no control over Billy, but my servants must not break the
rules of this house. If that Bridget dares to put her head inside of
this door I will send her about her business."

"Laura," said Kitty, "I wish you would be reasonable--like Billy and
me. We talked it all over on the way to church, and we saw that it
was Tom's crazy old tariff that was making all the trouble and
driving Bridget away and everything, and we decided we would stop
the tariff right away."

Laura's chin went into the air and her eyes flashed.

"_You_ will stop the tariff!" she cried, turning red. "What right
have _you_ to stop anything in this house, Kitty? And it isn't a
crazy tariff. It was a splendid idea, and no one but Tom would ever
have thought of it, and it worked all right until you and Billy
began spoiling it!"

"But I thought you wanted it stopped," said Kitty.

"I don't!" exclaimed Laura, bursting into tears. "It is a nice,
lovely ta