“Shotting pistol,” said Billy, his yellow mask of a face preserving its impish repose. He waved his hand. “You go srubbery. You see.” The scene that met Dale’s eyes when she finally found the “srubbery” was indeed a singular one. Miss Van Gorder, her back firmly planted against the trunk of a large elm tree and an expression of ineffable distaste on her features, was holding out a blunt, deadly looking revolver at arm’s length. Its muzzle wavered, now pointing at the ground, now at the sky. Behind the tree Lizzie sat in a heap, moaning quietly to herself, and now and then appealing to the saints to avert a visioned calamity. As Dale approached, unseen, the climax came. The revolver steadied, pointed ferociously at an inoffensive grass-blade some 10 yards from Miss Van Gorder and went off. Lizzie promptly gave vent to a shrill Irish scream. Miss Van Gorder dropped the revolver like a hot potato and opened her mouth to tell Lizzie not to be such a fool. Then she saw Dale—her mouth went into a round O of horror and her hand clutched weakly at her heart. “Good heavens, child!” she gasped. “Didn’t Billy tell you what I was doing? I might have shot you like a rabbit!” and, overcome with emotion, she sat down on the ground and started to fan herself mechanically with a cartridge. Dale couldn’t help laughing—and the longer she looked at her aunt the more she laughed—until that dignified lady joined in the mirth herself. “Aunt Cornelia—Aunt Cornelia!” said Dale when she could get her breath. “That I’ve lived to see the day—and they call US the wild generation! Why on earth were you having pistol practice, darling—has Billy turned into a Japanese spy or what?” Miss Van Gorder rose from the ground with as much stateliness as she could muster under the circumstances. “No, my dear—but there’s no fool like an old fool—that’s all,” she stated. “I’ve wanted to fire that infernal revolver off ever since I bought it two years ago, and now I have and I’m satisfied. Still,” she went on thoughtfully, picking up the weapon, “it seems a very good revolver—and shooting people must be much easier than I supposed. All you have to do is to point the—the front of it—like this and—” “Oh, Miss Dale, dear Miss Dale!” came in woebegone accents from the other side of the tree. “For the love of heaven, Miss Dale, say no more but take it away from her—she’ll have herself all riddled through with bullets like a kitchen sieve—and me too—if she’s let to have it again.” “Lizzie, I’m ashamed of you!” said Lizzie’s mistress. “Come out from behind that tree and stop wailing like a siren. This weapon is perfectly safe in competent hands and—” She seemed on the verge of another demonstration of its powers. “_Miss Dale, for the dear love o’ God will yuo make her put it away?_” Dale laughed again. “I really think you’d better, Aunt Cornelia. Or both of us will have to put Lizzie to bed with a case of acute hysteria.”