"Oh, that's all right, Mrs. Portheris. I don't like milk puddings--they give you a double chin. I expect you've eaten a lot of 'em in your time, haven't you, Mis' Portheris? Now, Mr. Mafferton, you sit here, and you, Mis' Wick, you sit _here_. That's right, Mr. Wick, you hold up the wall. I ain't proud, I'll sit on the floor--there now, we're every one fixed. No, Mr. Dod, none of us ladies object to smoking--Mis' Portheris smokes herself, don't you, Mis' Portheris?" "Emmeline, if you pass another remark to bed you go!" exclaimed her mother with unction. "I was fourteen the day before yesterday, and you don't send people of fourteen to bed. I got a town lot for a birthday present. Oh, there's the French gentleman! _Bon soir, Monsieur! Comment va-t-il! Attendez!_" and we were suddenly bereft of Emmeline. "She's gone to play poker with that man from Marseilles," remarked Mrs. Malt. "Really, husband, I don't know----" "You able to put a limit on the game?" asked poppa. Everybody laughed, and Mr. Malt said that it wasn't possible for Emmeline to play for money because she never could keep as much as five francs in her possession, but if she _did_ he'd think it necessary to warn the man from Marseilles that Miss Malt knew the game. "And she's perfectly right," continued her father, "in describing this illumination business as a fraud. I don't say it isn't pretty enough, but it's a fraud this way, they don't give you any choice about paying your money for it. Now we didn't start boarding at this hotel, we went to the one down there on the other side of the river. We were very much fatigued when we arrived, and every member of our party went straight to bed. Next day--I always call for my bills daily--what do I find in my account but '_Illumination de la chute de la Rhin_' one franc apiece." "And you hadn't ordered anything of the kind," said poppa. "Ordered it? I hadn't even seen it! Well, I didn't lose my temper. I took the document down to the office and asked to have it explained to me. The explanation was that it cost the hotel a large sum of money. I said I guessed it did, and it was also probably expensive to get hot and cold water laid on, but I didn't see any mention of that in the bill, though I used the hot and cold water, and didn't use the illumination." "That's so," said poppa. "Well, then the fellow said it was done all on my account, or words to that effect, and that it was a beautiful illumination and worth twice the money, and as it was the rule of the hotel he'd have to trouble me for the price of it." "Did you oblige him?" asked poppa.