"I can arrange it, if you like," Aubrey went on--mostly to me, for Billy's mother was silently thinking. "Do have him, Bee!" I cried. "I won't let him get in your way. He needn't even sleep in your room. I'll have Norah put up a cot in the alcove of the rose room. She can sleep there, and dress him and everything. You won't be annoyed the least bit." "Well," said Bee, with graceful reluctance, "if you are sure he won't be in your way, and if Aubrey's cousin will bring him, I see no reason why he mightn't come." I almost squealed in my delight. It would certainly be worth while to see the child's eyes when he first saw the calves and little chickens. I left both Aubrey and Bee at the table while I rushed up-stairs to see if the rose room would be just right for him. I made Aubrey promise to arrange everything by telegraph. Norah loved children, and entered into my plans with delight. Then I flew out to interview old Amos. He had told me only a few days before that the boys on the estate next ours wanted to sell their goats and goat carriages. The days passed rapidly in preparations, but of all my guests, titled or otherwise, it was Billy--my Billy--I wanted to see worst. In two days I got a letter. "Dear Miss Tats," it ran, "I only write to say that I shall be glad to come. If I had not written you a long letter so soon ago, I would write more now. Tell mother to be sure to meet me at the station. Don't let her forget that I shall arrive at four-sixteen. Your affectionate little nephew, Billy." I wept tears of delight over this effusion, and "so soon ago" passed into the Jardine vocabulary. In looking back, I think I can safely say that if Bee had known what would happen at that house-party to shock her English friends, she would have preferred to discharge her obligations to them by a nice little Sunday afternoon at Coney Island or an evening in Chinatown. But fortunately the English are a sensible race, and Sir Wemyss and his bride, perhaps because of the reasonable way the duchess came around when she found her daughter bent upon marrying Sir Wemyss, were so good-humoured and so plainly determined to see naught but good in America and naught but fun in Americans that they took everything in good part. Aubrey, Jimmie, and Sir Wemyss got on capitally from the start, for before they came Aubrey said: "What shall I say to them at first--when they come aboard of us, and before I have got my sea legs on?" "Why," said Jimmie, "that's dead easy. Say to Lady Mary, 'Let my wife give you some tea,' and to Sir Wemyss say, 'Old man, how would a whiskey and soda go?' and there you are right off the bat." Aubrey said precisely these words, with the most satisfactory result, for over her third cup of tea I felt very friendly with the beautiful English woman, and after four whiskies the men were almost sociable.