greeting the Ravendens responded with equal warmth. 

 “Dick, you scoundrel, why didn’t you tell me they were here?” cried Everard. 

 “I didn’t know you knew them,” returned the bewildered Dick. 

 “Know them? Why, I’ve spent a week of my latest vacation on their house-boat. The Lepidoptero of half the Southern States shriek aloud when they see Miss Ravenden and me approaching. Besides, I’m useful, am I not, Dolly?” 

 “Not in terms that could be reduced to an estimate,” said that young woman. 

 “Ungrateful maiden! Don’t I shoo off your swarming adorers, comprising all the polyglot of Washington and most of the blue blood of Philadelphia? I’m the only man in America who can be with Miss Dorothy Ravenden for three consecutive days without falling desperately in love with her. I escape only because I know it’s hopeless.” 

 “Oh, is that it?” said Dolly demurely. “I had heard there was a more tangible reason for my bereavement. Vardy, you’re looking serious in spite of all your nonsense. I believe, upon my soul, the stories are true.” 

 “Oh, Dick,” said Everard hastily, “I nearly forgot about that package of books. I dropped’em outside. Here they are and they’ll cost you just eight dollars and eighty cents and the price of a drink for my trouble in bringing them. Don’t know what they are, because I turned over your telegram to Towney; but by their weight they’re worth the money. Let’s have a look at them.” 

 Before Dick could protest he had opened the package. 

 “‘Summer reading for a young physician,’” he began, looking at the titles. “What have we here? Harris’ ‘Insects Injurious to Vegetation ‘The Butterfly Book,’ by Holland; ‘Special Report on the Spiders of Long Island’; ‘North American’—well, by my proud ancestral halls!” 

 “Give me those books, Ev!” said Dick sharply. “Little Everard, the Boy Wonder, has put a dainty foot in it again!” He laughed banteringly, looking from Dorothy Ravenden to Dick and back again. “Dick, too? Oh, Dolly, couldn’t you leave the family alone for my sake? Case of ‘Love me, love my bugs’!” 

 But even the much-allowanced Everard had gone too far. Dolly Ravenden turned upon him with an expression which boded ill for the venturesome young man, when a volume of song from the hallway, that seemed, controlled and effortless as it was, to fill 

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