I thought of tramps, but Ethel, being a woman, divined what had happened and bade me light a lantern quickly. I rushed to the kitchen and lighted it. The house was not on fire, that was certain. Minerva was either having a fit or an encounter with a burglar, for there was a sound as of heavy foot-falls and choking ejaculations. I seized the kitchen poker, expecting to sell my life at a bargain, but Ethel looked at me commiseratingly and with the one word “Bat,” she hurried up the back stairs. I must say that at first I took the word to mean that Minerva had been imbibing and I wondered at Ethel’s using so idiomatic an expression, but when she entered the room and the sounds almost immediately stopped, to be followed by sobbing, I suddenly divined what she meant. “No, Minerva, it isn’t poisonous.” (More lessons in Natural History.) “Probably the poor thing was more frightened than you are.” I did not think it at all likely. At any rate, it had been far more reticent. “I’ll give you a screen from the spare room to put in your window. It was attracted by the light. It’s a sort of mouse with wings.” “Striped rats and mice with wings! Lordy, the country’s awful!” Poor Minerva! She must have been surprised to see that country horses were just like those of the city. Certainly a horse has more evil potentiality than a stupid little bat, but when a beast has you by the hair and you see him, as it were, through the back of your head, he is apt to loom large and terrifying. Quiet was soon restored and Ethel came down with the lantern. I put away the poker which I had been holding ever since I picked it up. “It’s the greatest mercy in the world that the lamp went out. She knocked it over when the bat hit her.” “What next? Is the room moth miller proof? Could she survive a June bug?” “Well, really, it’s nothing to laugh at. If you ever have a bat in your back hair you’ll not think of laughing.” As my back hair is fast going to join the snows of yesteryear, I considered this a most unkind cut, but I was above retaliating—as I could not think of anything to say. “Well, Minerva has now been here a whole day and she’s hardly been out of our sight. I admit that she is an excellent cook and a hard worker, but as a steady visitor who, rides with us and sews with us she is likely to pall. Hasn’t she a mother who can come and visit her?” “No,” Ethel answered, “Minerva is an only child.” “And a child only,” said I. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER III AN EAST WIND.