rust, plain to us both."

It was even easier to soothe than to ruffle Mahony. "Remember me very
kindly to Mrs. Long, will you?" he said as the Archdeacon prepared to
climb into his buggy. "But tell her, too, I owe her a grudge just now.
My wife's so lost in flannel and brown holland that I can't get a word
out of her."

"And mine doesn't know where she'd be, with this bazaar, if it weren't
for Mrs. Mahony." Long was husband to a dot of a woman who, having
borne him half a dozen children of his own feature and build, now
worked as parish clerk and district visitor rolled in one; driving
about in sunbonnet and gardening-gloves behind a pair of cream
ponies--tiny, sharp-featured, resolute; with little of her husband's
large tolerance, but an energy that outdid his own, and made her an
object of both fear and respect. "And that reminds me: over at the
cross-roads by Spring Hill, I met your young brother-in-law. And he
told me, if I ran across you to ask you to hurry home. Your wife has
some surprise or other in store for you. No, nothing unpleasant! Rather
the reverse, I believe. But I wasn't to say more. Well, good-day,
doctor, good-day to you!"

Mahony smiled, nodded and went on his way. Polly's surprises were
usually simple and transparent things: some one would have made them a
present of a sucking-pig or a bush-turkey, and Polly, knowing his
relish for a savoury morsel, did not wish it to be overdone: she had
sent similar chance calls out after him before now.

When, having seen his horse rubbed down, he reached home, he found her
on the doorstep watching for him. She was flushed, and her eyes had
those peculiar high-lights in them which led him jokingly to exhort her
to caution: "Lest the sparks should set the house on fire!"

"Well, what is it, Pussy?" he inquired as he laid his bag down and hung
up his wide-awake. "What's my little surprise-monger got up her sleeve
to-day? Good Lord, Polly, I'm tired!"

Polly was smiling roguishly. "Aren't you going into the surgery,
Richard?" she asked, seeing him heading for the dining-room.

"Aha! So that's it," said he, and obediently turned the handle. Polly
had on occasion taken advantage of his absence to introduce some new
comfort or decoration in his room.

The blind had been let down. He was still blinking in the half-dark
when a figure sprang out from behind the door, barging heavily against
him, and a loud voice shouted: "Boh, you old beef-brains! Boh to a
goos