Gwynne, on the following day, was making a late toilet, and in anything but a good-humor, for he had grown accustomed to early rising, when he received a note from Isabel. It ran: DEAR PARTNER,--Anabel has just told me over the telephone that Tom and Mr. Leslie and two other representative citizens are going out to see you this afternoon. I have the ghost of an idea that a friendly call is not their only object. _Do_ be plastic--it is better in the beginning--until you know your ground. Above all, don't be too English. You are vastly improved, but you have lapses. I send you your share of the ducks. Mariana's roasting will explain our pride in one of the two most native of our products--the next time we go to San Francisco I'll take you to the market and we will sit in a grimy little balcony restaurant and you will be introduced to fried California oysters. Please consider the marsh your own; and whenever you come, remember that you are to have breakfast or supper with me. Are you quite comfortable? If anything is wrong I will go over and interview Mariana and the Jap. Of course the latter will appropriate your cigarettes and books; he is probably a prince, and far from condescending to steal, he will take them as his right; and his hauteur may match your own at times. Moreover, he may decamp any morning without giving notice--Lafcadio Hearn dwells upon the _impermanency_ of the Japanese, and we can all bear him out. But on the other hand the Jap will keep your house cleaner than any other sort of servant, and he can be both amiable and alert when he chooses. I merely warn you, for I know nothing of your present _homme de chambre_ beyond the recommendation of my Chuma, who is amiable to the verge of imbecility. If he disappears, let me know at once, for I really want to make you comfortable and contented in what I know must seem to you little more than a beautiful wilderness peopled by ambitious barbarians. But wait till you know San Francisco! ISABEL. Gwynne smiled at the form of address and the expressions of concern in his welfare; but he scowled twice over the admonition to be plastic and American. "I'll be what I damn please," he announced, aloud, much to the surprise of Imura Kisaburo Hinomoto who entered at the moment with his shaving water.