“Oh, doesn’t that sound just like Aunt Rebecca!” cried Beth. “She’s so afraid I’ll not be nice! But she wouldn’t stand in the way, if she died getting out of the way--I mean in the way of something best for me. She is good; Aunt Rebecca really is good! But perhaps she won’t mind much if I’m gone just this summer longer! There’s so much to take up your mind in summer--preservings and cannings and fighting flies! Aunt Rebecca won’t let one fly pull his head forward and rub it with his feet in her house the way they do. She flaps him with a folded newspaper before he can twiddle his feet once! She has a great deal more to take up her attention in summer than she has in winter. Oh, Uncle Jim, I guess the honest truth is I want to think Aunt Rebecca won’t care if I’m away, I want to stay so dreadfully, dreadfully much!” “The greatest good of the greatest number! On that principle you ought to stay because there are so many of us to one Aunt Rebecca, and we want you to stay ‘so dreadfully, dreadfully much’!” Mr. Cortlandt affirmed this statement with a pat on Beth’s shoulder. At this moment Beth’s girl cousins came into the library, followed by Dirk with an air of wishing there were something to do better than following them. “Where in the world are you, Beth?” cried Alys, unnecessarily, since her eyes were on her cousin as she spoke. “We’ve looked everywhere for you. What can you and father be doing in this dim light?” “Beth and I have been chatting in the firelight, Alys,” Mr. Cortlandt replied for Beth. “Dim light and brilliant talk often go together. Though has our conversation been brilliant, Miss Bristead?” “It has been nice,” said Beth decidedly, slipping from her perch, recognizing that the quiet hour she had enjoyed so much was over. “I’m going to have a Twelfth Night revel--in the afternoon. You’re asked,” Dirk announced to Beth, meeting her in the hall a day or two after New Year’s. “Beans in cake, king and queen, all those things?” cried Beth eagerly, instantly reverting to her favorite ballads and romance at the name of Twelfth Night. “Beans! Beans in cake! You mean raisins, don’t you?” asked Dirk staring. “No. But it was only one bean; I remember now. Whoever got the bean in the cake was king of the revel,” explained Beth. “Well, I’m the king of my own revel, only there isn’t a bean about it and I’m not going to say I’m running it. I’m not going to ask one single girl but you. I suppose Nat and Alys will be around, but I’m not going to ask them; maybe they’ll have something else on the go. I’ve asked the boys and you. We’re going to have it in the gym. Bob Leonard’ll come. You wear that white and gold thing you had on at the Christmas tree. We’re going to play something that’ll just come in to fit. Will you come, Beth?” Dirk ended anxiously, as if he feared his taste in revels might not appeal to Beth. “’Course,” Beth accepted briefly. “Do I have to know ahead what the game is?”