n.

"Well, I never!" she exclaimed; "that was _some_ stunt! Say, I'm sorry,
Cousin Patty,--but I'm a little kerflummixed,--and I may as well own up
to it."

"Oh, don't be that!" Patty laughed, carelessly. "Forget the past and
enjoy a piece of hot chicken. It's real good,--isn't it?"

"It's great! I never tasted anything like it!" Whereupon, Azalea took
in her fingers a wing and, with both elbows on the table, proceeded to
enjoy it in her own informal way. But both little fingers were carefully
extended at right angles to the others. She glanced at them now and then,
to make sure.

Her equanimity restored by Patty's kindliness and tact, the girl lapsed
into what was, doubtless, her customary way of eating. She displayed
undue gusto, smacked her lips at the appearance of a dainty dish and when
the dessert proved to be ice cream, she rolled her eyes ceilingward, and
patted her chest in a very ecstasy of anticipation.

It was too much for Farnsworth. He appreciated Patty's patience and
endurance, but he knew just how she felt. And it was _his_ cousin who was
acting like a wild Indian at their pretty home table!

"Azalea," he said,--Norah had left the dining-room,--"who brought you up?
Your mother died some years ago. With whom have you lived since?"

"Why,--oh,--only with Papa."

"But Uncle Thorpe,--I remember him well,--was a simple soul, but he was a
quiet, well-behaved man. Why didn't he teach you to be more restrained in
your ways,--especially at table?"

"Restrained? Oh, you mean I eat too much! Well, I have got a big
appetite, but to-night I guess I'm specially hungry. Or else your eats
are specially good! You don't mind how much I eat, do you, Cousin Patty?"

"Of course she doesn't," Farnsworth went on, trying to look severe but
obliged to smile at Azalea's total unconsciousness of any wrong manners
on her part. "But she does care if you behave like a 'wild and woolly,'
although she's too polite to say so!"

"Wild and woolly nothing! I've been awful careful to crook out my
finger,--and that's the very reason why I upset the tumbler!"

"That's true," agreed Patty, "and so, Zaly, suppose you discontinue that
habit. It isn't done this year."

"Honest? That so? I'd be mighty glad to quit it!"

"Do, then," put in Bill. "And while we're on the subject, you won't mind
if I go into it a little more deeply,--will you?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, for one thing, they don't put elbows on the table this seaso