"What a shame!" exclaims Dulce, starting and growing crimson, as she becomes aware they have all been listening to her little lecture. "I call it right down _mean_ to go listening to people behind their backs. It is horrid! And you, too, Portia! So shabby!" "Now who is scolding," says Portia; "and after your charming sermon, too, to Jennings, all about the evil effects of losing one's temper." "If you only knew how unhappy it makes us," says Dicky Browne, mimicking Dulce's own manner of a moment since so exactly that they all laugh aloud; and Dulce, forgetting her chagrin, laughs, too, even more heartily than they do. "You shan't have one bit of my jam," she says, threatening Dicky with a huge silver spoon; "see if you do! After all, cook," turning to that portly matron, "I think I'm tired to-day. Suppose you make this jam; and I can make some more some other time." As she says this, she unfastens both the aprons and flings them far from her, and pulls down her sleeves over her pretty white arms, to Gower's everlasting regret, who cannot take his eyes off them, and to whom they are a "joy forever." "Come, let us go up-stairs again," says Dulce to her assembled friends, who have all suddenly grown very grave. In silence they follow her, until once more the hall is gained and the kitchen forgotten. Then Dicky Browne gives way to speech. "I am now quite convinced," he says, slowly, "that to watch the making of plum jam is the most enthralling sport in the world. It was so kind of you, dear Dulce, to ask us to go down to see it. I don't know _when_ I have enjoyed myself so much." "We have been disgracefully taken in," says Julia, warmly. "And she didn't even offer us a single plum!" says Mr. Browne, tearfully. "You shall have some presently, with your tea," says Dulce, remorsefully. "Let us go and sit upon the verandah, and say what we thought of our dance. No one has said anything about it yet." Though late in September, it is still "one of those heavenly days that cannot die." The sun is warm in the heavens, though gradually sinking, poor tired god, toward his hard-earned rest. There are many softly-colored clouds on the sky. Tea is brought to them presently, and plums for Dicky; and then they are all, for the most part, happy. "Well, I think it was a deadly-lively sort of an evening," says Mr. Browne, candidly, _apropos_ of the ball. "Every one seemed cross, I think, and out of sorts. For my own part, there were moments when I suffered great mental anguish." "Well, I don't know," says Sir Mark, "for my part, I enjoyed myself rather above the average. Good music, good supper--the champagne I must congratulate you about, Dulce--and very pretty women. What more could even a Sybarite like Dicky desire? Mrs. George Mainwaring was there, and I got on capitally with her. I like a woman who prefers sitting it out, _some_ times." "I don't think I even saw Mrs. George," says Dulce. "Was she here?"