"I say the only way to get along is to take things as they come. I was just telling Mr. Tucker that one can't expect the comforts of the Jefferson Hotel up in camp, but then if one wants the comforts of the Jefferson one had better go there and not come to the country. Now I would give up any comforts for the beauties of nature!" and so on, and so on! Dee danced the old-fashioned waltz until she almost forgot how to do a single modern step. The grouchy bachelor forgot to worry about the possibility of damp sheets and babbled along about the dances of the eighties, and promised to teach his young partner the racket and the heel and toe polka if any of the records would fit those defunct dances. The sprightliness of that particular bachelor was catching, and the two others, who had begun to inquire about time tables with a view to beating a hasty retreat to the safety-firstness of the city, found themselves cheering up, too; and warmed by the good hot coffee, they began to dance with youthful ardor and actually grumbled when the crowd broke up for needed repose. "Aren't the Tuckers splendid?" said Douglas, when she and her sisters were undressing. "Indeed they are," agreed Helen, "and I like that little Allison girl a lot, too. She waltzed in and helped with the eats as though she were one of us." "I think Mr. Tucker is kind of gone on her," drawled Nan. "Nonsense! You are always thinking somebody is gone on somebody," laughed Helen. "Well, somebody always is. He treats her just like he does the twins, only different." "How's that, like triplets?" But Nan had gone to sleep before she could formulate her ideas about how Mr. Tucker treated Page. She only devoutly hoped he would devise some method by which he could persuade her mother to give up the idea of going to White Sulphur and let Douglas alone about making her debut the following winter. CHAPTER IX MR. MACHIAVELLI TUCKER Nan wondered what Mr. Tucker had in mind to relieve the situation which she had so ingenuously disclosed to him on that little walk in the moonlight. The next morning she watched him closely and there was something about the businesslike way in which he sought out Mrs. Carter, when that lady appeared long after breakfast, that made her divine he had something up his sleeve. The charming lady was looking especially lovely in a white linen morning dress. She said she had slept splendidly in spite of the fact that she rather missed the rolling of the ship. Again she had kept Susan so busy waiting on her that the labor of serving breakfast properly had fallen on Helen. A tray of breakfast had to be arranged exactly as though they were still in the city, and Susan made many trips from the cabin to the kitchen.