"Mr. or Mrs.?" I interrupted. "The head of the house," pursued Silvia, ignoring my question, "is a collector." "So I inferred. Has he a large collection of soup plates?" "She collects antiquities and writes their history. He pursues science." "They were seemingly communicative. What did they look like?" "I didn't see them. After I rang I heard a woman's voice bidding some one not to answer the bell. She said she couldn't be bothered with interruptions, so I went on up the street to call on Mrs. Fleming, who told me all about them. She was also refused admittance when she called. On my way home I met that boy--that awful boy----" She paused, evidently overcome by the consideration of his awfulness. "He had been digging bait--" Again she paused as if words were inadequate for her climax. "Well," I encouraged. "He was carrying his bait--horrid, wriggling angleworms--in our soup plate!" "Then it is not broken yet!" I exclaimed joyfully. "Let us hope it is given an antiseptic bath before father's next indulgence in consommé. After dinner I will go over and try my luck at paying my respects to the soup savant." "They won't let you in." "In that case I shall follow their lead of setting aside all ceremony and formality and admit myself, as their heir apparent does here." After dinner and my twilight smoke, I went next door, first asking Silvia if there was anything we needed that I could borrow, just to show them there were no hard feelings. My third vigorous ring brought results. A slipshod servant appeared and reluctantly seated me in the hall. She read with seeming interest the card I handed to her and then, pushing aside some mangy looking portières, vanished from view. She evidently delivered my card, for I heard a woman's voice read my name, "Mr. Lucien Wade." After another short interval the slovenly servant returned and offered me my card. "She seen it," she assured me in answer to my look of surprise. She again put the portières between us and I was obliged to own myself baffled in my efforts to break in. I was showing myself out when my onward course was deflected by a troop of noisy children leaded by the soup plate skirmisher, who was the oldest and apparently the leader of the brood. "Oh, halloa!" he greeted me with the air of an old acquaintance, "didn't you see the folks?" On my informing him that I had seen no one but the servant, he exclaimed: "Oh, that chicken wouldn't know enough to ask you in! Just follow us. Mother wouldn't remember to come out."