.

"Shall I raise a window?" he suggested finally. "It's rather--er--hot
in here."

"Yes, do," she urged. "Raise all of them. It's--do you--do you notice
a--a funny smell in here? Or am I imagining it? It--it almost makes
me sick!"

"Yes, there is a smell," he said, in evident relief. "I thought maybe
you'd been cleaning the carpet with something. It's ghastly. Can't we
go somewhere else?"

"Come on." She opened the door into the sitting-room. "We're coming
out here if you do not mind, Prue." And Fairy explained the difficulty.

"Why, that's very strange," said Prudence, knitting her brows. "I was
in there right after supper, and I didn't notice anything. What does
it smell like?"

"It's a new smell to me," laughed Fairy, "but something about it is
strangely suggestive of our angel-twins."

Prudence went to investigate, and Fairy shoved a big chair near the
table, waving her hand toward it lightly with a smile at Babbie. Then
she sank into a low rocker, and leaned one arm on the table. She
wrinkled her forehead thoughtfully.

"That smell," she began. "I am very suspicious about it. It was not
at all natural----"

"Excuse me, Fairy," he said, ill at ease for the first time in her
knowledge of him. "Did you know your sleeve was coming out?"

Fairy gasped, and raised her arm.

"Both arms, apparently," he continued, smiling, but his face was
flushed.

"Excuse me just a minute, will you?" Fairy was unruffled. She sought
her sister. "Look here, Prue,--what do you make of this? I'm coming
to pieces! I'm hanging by a single thread, as it were."

Her sleeves were undoubtedly ready to drop off at a second's notice!
Prudence was shocked. She grew positively white in the face.

"Oh, Fairy," she wailed. "We are disgraced."

"Not a bit of it," said Fairy coolly. "I remember now that Lark was
looking for the scissors before supper. Aren't those twins unique?
This is almost bordering on talent, isn't it? Don't look so
distressed, Prue. Etiquette itself must be subservient to twins, it
seems. Don't forget to bring in the stew at a quarter past nine, and
have it as good as possible,--please, dear."

"I will," vowed Prudence, "I'll--I'll use cream. Oh, those horrible
twins!"

"Go in and entertain Babbie till I come down, won't you?" And Fairy
ran lightly up the stairs, humming a snatch of song.

But Prudence did a poor job of entertaining Babbie during her sister's
absence. She fel