“Your mother is incapable of such an action. How little you know her worth! She is only waiting to be assured that you are to have my greenheart, with a reel that spins fifty yards of silk. She shall have it, Mrs Dene.” “Is it as good as the hornbeam?” asked Ruth, smiling. “The old hornbeam! do you remember that? I say, Ruth, you spoke of shooting. Really, can you still shoot?” “Could I ever forget after such teaching?” “Well, now, I call _that_ a girl!” cried Rex, enthusiastically. “Let us hope some people won’t call it a hoyden!” said Mrs Dene, with the tender pride that made her faultfinding like a caress. “The idea of a girl carrying an absurd little breech-loading rifle all over Europe!” “What! the one I had built for her?” “I suppose so,” said Mrs Dene, with a shade more of reserve. “Miss Dene, you shall kill the first chamois that I see!” “I fear, Mr Gethryn, the Duke Alfons Adalbert Maximilian in Baiern will have something to say about that!” “Oh—h—h! Preserved?” “Yes, indeed, preserved!” “But they told me I might shoot on the Sonnewendjoch.” “Ah! But that’s in Tyrol, just across the line. You can see it from here. Austrian game laws aren’t Bavarian game laws, sir!” “How much of this country does your duke own?” “Just half a dozen mountains, and half a dozen lakes, and half a hundred trout streams, with all the splendid forests belonging to them.” “Lucky duke! And is the game preserved in the whole region? Can’t one get a shot?” “One cannot even carry a gun without a permit.” Rex groaned. “And the trout—I suppose they are preserved, too?” “Yes, but the Herr Förster has the right to fish and so have his guests. There are, however, conditions. The fish you take are not yours. You must buy as many of them as you want to keep, afterward. And they must be brought home alive—or as nearly alive as is consistent with being shut up in a close, round, green tin box, full of water which becomes tepid as it is carried along by a peasant boy in the heat. They usually die of suffocation. But to the German mind that is all right. It is only not right when one kills them instantly and lays them in a cool creel, on fresh wet ferns and moss.” “Nevertheless, I think we will dispense with the boy and the green box, in favor of the ferns and moss, assisted by a five franc piece or two.” “It isn’t francs any more; you’re not in France. It’s marks here, you know.” “Well, I have the same faith in the corrupting power of marks as of francs, or lire, or shillings, or dollars.” “And I think you will find your confidence justified,” said Mrs Dene, smiling. “Mamma trying to be cynical!” said Ruth, teasingly. “Isn’t she funny, Rex!” A thoughtful look stole over her mother’s face. “I can be terrible, too, sometimes—” she said in her little, clear, high soprano voice; and she gazed musingly at the edge of a letter, which just appeared above the table, and then sank out of sight in her lap.