ard, "I rather expect Jack will be round
here and I will ask him. I know he would like it, and I should too--if
you are sure Mrs. Graves approves."

"Oh, yes," said Miss Merry, smiling, "she always approves of people
doing what they like."

Miss Merry still hesitated at the door. "May I ask you another
question, Mr. Kennedy--I hope I am not troublesome--I wonder if you
could suggest some books for us to read? I read a good deal to Mrs.
Graves, and I am afraid we get rather into a groove. We ought to read
some of the new books; we want to know what people are saying and
thinking--we don't want to get behind."

"Why, of course," said Howard, "I shall be delighted--but I am afraid I
am not likely to be of much use; I don't read as much as I ought; but
if you will tell me the sort of things you care about, and what you
have been reading, we will try to make out a list. Won't you sit down
and see what we can do?"

"Oh, I don't like to interrupt you," said Miss Merry. "But if you would
be so kind."

She sat down at the far end of the table, and Howard was dimly and
amusedly conscious that this tete-a-tete was of the nature of a
romantic adventure to the little lady. He was surprised, when they came
to talk, to find how much they appeared to have read of a solid kind.
He asked if they had any plan.

"No, indeed," said Miss Merry, "we just wander on; one thing suggests
another. Mrs. Graves likes LONG books; she says she likes to get at a
subject quietly--that there ought not to be too many good things in
books; she likes them slow and spacious."

"I am afraid one has to go back a good way for that!" said Howard.
"People can't afford now to know more than a manual of a couple of
hundred pages can tell them about a subject. I can tell you some good
historical books, and some books of literary criticism and biography. I
can't do much about poetry or novels; and philosophy, science, and
theology I am no use at all for. But I could get you some advice if you
like. That's the best of Cambridge, there are so many people about who
are able to tell what to read."

While they were making out a list, Jack arrived breathlessly, and Miss
Merry shamefacedly withdrew. Howard said: "Perhaps that will do to go
on with--we will have another talk to-morrow. I begin to see the sort
of thing you want."

Jack was in a state of high excitement.

"What on earth were you doing," he said, as the door closed, "with that
sedate spinster?"