"You'll find your partner amply able to keep you straight," she answered.

The game began. Miss Tilghman won the cut and made it a Royal Spade.

"They no longer play Royal Spades in New York," said Miss Erskine.

"Don't know about New York," returned Miss Tilghman, placidly, "but we're playing them here, this evening. Your lead, Miss Amelia."

The latter shut her thick lips tightly, an instant.

"Oh, well, I suppose we must be provincial a little longer," she said, sarcastically. "Of course, you do not still play Royal Spades in Northumberland, Mr. Croyden."

"Yes, indeed! Play anything to keep the game moving," Croyden answered.

"Oh, to be sure! I forgot, for the instant, that Northumberland is a rapid town.--I call that card, Edith--the King of Hearts!" as Miss Tilghman inadvertently exposed it.

A moment later, Miss Tilghman, through anger, also committed a revoke, which her play on the succeeding trick disclosed.

That it was a game for pure pleasure, without stakes, made no difference to Miss Erskine. Technically it was a revoke, and she was within her rights when she exclaimed it.

"Three tricks!" she said exultantly, "and you cannot make game this hand."

"I'm very sorry, partner," Miss Tilghman apologized.

"It's entirely excusable under the circumstances," said Dangerfield, with deliberate accent. "You may do it again!"

"How courteous Mr. Dangerfield is," Miss Erskine smiled. "To my mind, nothing excuses a revoke except sudden blindness."

"And you would claim it even then, I suppose?" Dangerfield retorted.

"I said, sudden blindness was the only excuse, Mr. Dangerfield. Had you observed my language more closely, you doubtless would have understood.--It is your lead, partner."

Dangerfield, with a wink at Croyden, subsided, and the hand was finished, as was the next, when Croyden was dummy, without further jangling. But midway in the succeeding hand, Miss Erskine began.

"My dear Mr. Croyden," she said, "when 

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