"Well, you are the queerest one!" exclaimed Joyce. "Who would have thought you'd care so much about it! Of course, I'm willing to go in for it, but I can't give my share till after the first of the month. Why do you want to do it so soon?" "Oh, I don't know--just because I _do_!" replied Cynthia, a little confused in manner. "Come! Let's buy the candles right off. And suppose we do a little dusting and cleaning up in the morning, and fix the candles in the candelabrum, and in the afternoon light them up and have the fun of watching them?" Joyce agreed to this heartily, and they turned into a store to purchase the candles. Much to Joyce's amazement, Cynthia insisted on investing in the best _wax_ ones she could obtain, though they cost nearly five cents apiece. "Tallow ones will do!" whispered Joyce, aghast at such extravagance. But Cynthia shook her head, and came away with more than fifty. "I wanted them _good_!" she said, and Joyce could not budge her from this position. Then, to change the subject, which was plainly becoming embarrassing to her, Cynthia abruptly remarked: "Don't forget, Joyce, that you are coming over to my house to dinner, and this evening we'll do our studying, so that to-morrow we can have the whole day free. And bring your music over, too. Perhaps we'll have time to practise that duet afterward." "I will," agreed Joyce, and she turned in at her own gate. Joyce came over that evening, bringing her books and music. As Mr. and Mrs. Sprague were occupying the sitting-room, the two girls decided to work in the dining-room, and accordingly spread out their books and papers all over the big round table. Cynthia settled down methodically and studiously, as was her wont. But Joyce happened to be in one of her "fly-away humors" (so Cynthia always called them), when she found it quite impossible to concentrate her thoughts or give her serious attention to anything. These moods were always particularly irritating to Cynthia, who rarely indulged in causeless hilarity, especially at study periods. Prudently, however, she made no remarks. "Let's commence with geometry," she suggested, opening the text-book. "Here we are, at Proposition XVI." "All right," assented Joyce, with deceptive sweetness. "Give me a pencil and paper, please." Cynthia handed them to her and began: "Angle A equals angle B." "_Angel_ A equals _angel_ B," murmured Joyce after her. "Joyce, I wish you would _not_ say that!" interrupted Cynthia, sharply. "Why not?" inquired Joyce with pretended surprise, at the same time decorating the corners of her diagram with cherubic heads and wings. "Because it confuses me so I can't think!" said Cynthia. "Please call things by their right names." "But it makes no difference with the proof, what you call things in geometry," argued Joyce, "whether it's angles or angels or caterpillars or coal-scuttles,--it's all the same in the end!" Cynthia ignored this, swallowed her rising wrath, and doggedly began anew: