"Oh, well," Katrine allowed, "that's true! But Isabel lived before his days. Did you ever play a game of making up Isabel Carnaby conversations? It's rather fun." "Not I... Couldn't to save my life... Far too difficult." "Oh, it's easy enough, given the right people, and the right hour. It would be no use starting it at the beginning of an evening when every one is stiff and strained, but it goes splendidly after supper. Isabel begins by giving a definition of some well-known term, and invites every one else to follow suit. It is a favourite game of Grizel's, my sister-in-law. We always make her Isabel for she is such a beguiling little thing that she is not only witty herself, but spurs up every one else to be witty too. One night we took `_Bores_' for a subject, and she said: `A bore is a person who remembers all that I say on Sunday, chews a mental cud over it, and throws up masticated morsels of my own conversation to confound my inconsistency on Wednesday.' Then we all said: `That is quite true!' and `Quite so!' and she addressed each of us and asked: `And what is your idea of a bore, Mrs Seaton? Johanna, give us your definition of the term?' and we each scintillated to the best of our ability, and then mentally adjourned into the kitchen and interviewed the old servant in her turn." "I should be so devoured with anxiety thinking out my own sally that I shouldn't be able to appreciate my neighbour's brilliance... Bores are a pretty prolific subject. I should like, just for curiosity, to hear _your_ definition." "`Katrine! let us now have your definition of the term,'" quoted Katrine mockingly. "There, you see, you are already starting the game on your own account. Why do you want to know?" "So that I may act contrariwise, of course." "It is true... Isabel was right. Here you are already, back at our bacon! I am afraid, Captain Bedford, that you are very much absorbed in yourself." "Devoted to him! Of course. Why shouldn't I be? Know him so well, don't you know--understand his ways! Capital fellow, when you know him.--A woman asked me once whom I loved best in the world. I said: `Myself, of course.' It was the bed-rock truth; it is the truth about most solitary people, if they would only admit it, but she was shocked." "I'm shocked, too. Even if it were true, I don't think one should admit--" "I don't say it now. It would not be true. That was some time ago." Katrine's thoughts flew back with instant recollection to the day before, to the quiet pocketing of the tortoise-shell trifle. She waited silently, holding her breath in the intensity of her anxiety, but no explanation was vouchsafed. She tossed her head with a restless gesture, and said tentatively: "You--you are not in the least what I expected." "What precisely did you expect?" "N-othing precisely, but everything different! I thought you'd be older for one thing, and would look more worn. Captain Blair said you were shy and silent."