"I wasn't a mite bored at the start. I loved going round with you and seeing your friends, but I _have_ seen them, and they've seen me, and we said all we want to, so that trick is played out. You can't go on drinking tea with the same old ladies all the days of your life? Why can't they hit on something fresh?" Miss Briskett did not reply. She was indeed too much upset for words. Tea-drinking was the only form of dissipation in which she and her friends indulged, or had indulged for many years past. In more energetic days an occasional dinner had varied the monotony, but as time crept on there seemed a dozen reasons for dropping the more elaborate form of entertainment. A dinner-party upset the servants; it necessitated the resurrection of the best dinner-service from the china cupboard, and the best silver from the safe; it entailed late hours, a sense of responsibility, the exertion of entertaining. How much simpler to buy a sixpenny jar of cream and a few shillings worth of cake welcome your friends at half-past four, and be free at half-past five to lie down on the sofa, and have a nap before dressing for dinner! Miss Briskett had counted on a protracted orgy of tea-parties in her niece's honour, and had already planned a return bout on her own accord, to set the ball rolling a second time. Her wildest flight of fancy had not soared beyond tea, and here was Cornelia showing signs of rebellion at the end of a fortnight! It said much for the impression which that young lady had made that there was a note of actual entreaty in the voice in which her aunt addressed her. "I think you must reconsider your decision, Cornelia. I strongly wish you to accept these invitations, and my friends will be much disappointed if you refuse. When you understand the position, I feel sure you will put your own wishes on one side, and consent to do what is right and fitting." But Miss Cornelia tossed her head, and the impish light flashed back into her golden eyes. "I ken't break my word," she said bluntly. In moments of friction her American accent was even more strongly marked than usual, which fact was not calculated to soften her aunt's irritation, "Poppar had me taught to say a thing and stick to it, no matter how I suffered. I've _said_ I won't go, and I _won't_--not if all the old ladies in Christendom were to come and howl at the door! You ken tell 'em I've come out in spots, and you reckon I'm going down with small-pox." "That would not be true." "Oh, shucks!" shrugged Cornelia. "Troth is a fine institootion, but, like most old things, it gives out at times, and then there's nothing for it but to fall back upon good, new-fashioned imagination." Miss Briskett rose majestically from her seat and left the room.