To return to this particular day of sulking; Rex had cast a shoe, and lamed himself just enough to prevent her riding, and so Beatrice was having a dull day of it in the house. Besides, her mother had just finished talking to her for her good, which was enough to send an angel into the sulks--and Beatrice lacked a good deal of being an angel. Dorman laid his baking-powder can confidingly in his divinity's lap. “Be'trice, I did get some grasshoppers; you said I couldn't. And you wouldn't go fishin', 'cause you didn't like to take Uncle Dick's make-m'lieve flies, so I got some really ones, Be'trice, that'll wiggle dere own self.” “Oh, dear me! It's too hot, Dorman.” “'Tisn't, Be'trice It's dest as cool--and by de brook it's awf-lly cold. Come, Be'trice!” He pulled at the smart little pink ruffles on her skirt. “I'm too sleepy, hon.” “You can sleep by de brook, Be'trice. I'll let you,” he promised generously, “'cept when I need anudder grasshopper; nen I'll wake you up.” “Wait till to-morrow. I don't believe the fish are hungry to-day. Don't tear my skirt to pieces, Dorman!” Dorman began to whine. He had never found his divinity in so unlovely a mood. “I want to go now! Dey are too hungry, Be'trice! Looey Sam is goin' to fry my fishes for dinner, to s'prise auntie. Come, Be'trice!” “Why don't you go with the child, Beatrice? You grow more selfish every day.” Mrs. Lansell could not endure selfishness--in others. “You know he will not give us any peace until you do.” Dorman instantly proceeded to make good his grandmother's prophecy, and wept so that one could hear him a mile. “Oh, dear me! Be still, Dorman--your auntie has a headache. Well, get your rod, if you know where it is--which I doubt.” Beatrice flounced out of the hammock and got her hat, one of those floppy white things, fluffed with thin, white stuff, till they look like nothing so much as a wisp of cloud, with ribbons to moor it to her head and keep it from sailing off to join its brothers in the sky. Down by the creek, where the willows nodded to their own reflections in the still places, it was cool and sweet scented, and Beatrice forgot her grievances, and was not sorry she had come. (It was at about this time that a tall young fellow, two miles down the coulee, put away his field glass and went off to saddle his horse.) “Don't run ahead so, Dorman,” Beatrice cautioned. To her had been given the doubtful honor of carrying the baking-powder can of grasshoppers. Even divinities must make themselves useful to man. “Why, Be'trice?” Dorman swished his rod in unpleasant proximity to his divinity's head. “Because, honey”--Beatrice dodged--“you might step on a snake, a rattlesnake, that would bite you.” “How would it bite, Be'trice?” “With its teeth, of course; long, wicked teeth, with poison on them.”