[_And the Colonel goes to the club to relieve his mind by a quantity of vigorous expletives, and then to settle down to an evening of what he calls real whist._] Tale the Third. SAUCY BETTY MORK. SAUCY BETTY MORK. I. "But, Miss Bessie--" "I have told you a dozen times, Mr. Granton, that my name is not Bessie. I abhor that final _ie_; and more than that, I was christened Betty,--plain Betty,--and Betty I will be." "Miss Betty, then, if that suits you; though why you should be so particular about that old-fashioned name, I'm sure I can't conceive." "In the first place, it is my name," Betty replied, bending upon him a glance at once bewitching and tantalizing; "that ought to count for something; and in the second place, my family name isn't one that lends itself to soft prefixes. Besides all which, there has been a Betty Mork from time immemorial; and I shall never be one to spoil the line by changing my name." "What?" Mr. Granton demanded mischievously. "Never change it? Are you vowed to eternal single blessedness, then, or shall you imitate the women's-rights women, who--" "It is really none of your affair what I intend to do," returned she, bridling; "only, to go back to what we started on, I do intend to play in the tournament with Frank Bradford. I am not in the habit of breaking my promises." The pair walked along the shady country road without speaking for a moment or two, the young man inclined to be sulky, his companion saucy and good-natured. The dropping sunshine, falling through the gently waving elm-boughs, struck golden lights out of Miss Mork's abundant chestnut hair,--her one beauty, it amused her to call it, although the smile which brought out her dimples and the lustre of her eyes contradicted the words even while they were being spoken. Young Granton was fully alive to the attractiveness of the lithe figure beside him; indeed, for his own peace of mind, far too keenly. He was aware, too, of the difficulty of managing the wilful beauty, whose independence was sufficiently understood by all the summer idlers at Maugus. "But you certainly knew I expected you to play in the tournament with me," he began again, returning to the attack. "It isn't modest for a girl ever to know what a man expects of her until she's told," Betty replied demurely, "even in tennis. And besides, it was presumptuous for you to be so royally certain of my acquiescence in whatever you deigned to plan." "I'll serve a cut so that you'll never be able to return it," threatened he. "I can serve a cut myself," she retorted, with an accent which seemed to indicate a double significance in the words. "Confound it!" he said, incisively, with sudden and inconsistent change of base, "it is perfect folly letting ladies into a tournament anyway. Who wants them? They always make trouble."