swallow it right away, because there are guests to see you.” 

 I emerged from the first dip into the yellow mixture and fixed on her as stern and terrible a look at any one can whose mouth is encircled by a mustache of yellow foam. 

 “Guests!” I roared, “not for me! Don’t you dare to say that they came to see me!” 

 “Did too,” insists Norah, with firmness, “they came especially to see you. Asked for you, right from the jump.” 

 I finished the egg-nogg in four gulps, returned the empty tumbler with an air of decision, and sank upon the grass. 

 “Tell ’em I rave. Tell ’em that I’m unconscious, and that for weeks I have recognized no one, not even my dear sister. Say that in my present nerve-shattered condition I—” 

 “That wouldn’t satisfy them,” Norah calmly interrupts, “they know you’re crazy because they saw you out here from their second story back windows. That’s why they came. So you may as well get up and face them. I promised them I’d bring you in. You can’t go on forever refusing to see people, and you know the Whalens are—” 

 “Whalens!” I gasped. “How many of them? Not—not the entire fiendish three?” 

 “All three. I left them champing with impatience.” 

 The Whalens live just around the corner. The Whalens are omniscient. They have a system of news gathering which would make the efforts of a New York daily appear antiquated. They know that Jenny Laffin feeds the family on soup meat and oat-meal when Mr. Laffin is on the road; they know that Mrs. Pearson only shakes out her rugs once in four weeks; they can tell you the number of times a week that Sam Dempster comes home drunk; they know that the Merkles never have cream with their coffee because little Lizzie Merkle goes to the creamery every day with just one pail and three cents; they gloat over the knowledge that Professor Grimes, who is a married man, is sweet on Gertie Ashe, who teaches second reader in his school; they can tell you where Mrs. Black got her seal coat, and her husband only earning two thousand a year; they know who is going to run for mayor, and how long poor Angela Sims has to live, and what Guy Donnelly said to Min when he asked her to marry him. 

 The three Whalens—mother and daughters—hunt in a group. They send meaning glances to one another across the room, and at parties they get together and 

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