"It is fully fifteen minutes since she left, Nellie. You might have written two or three pages already; and you know that all manner of visitors will be coming in by noon." "I was just thinking over something she told me. I'll write presently." "Mrs. Waldron is a woman who talks about everything and everybody. I advise you to listen to her no more than you can help. What was it she told you?" Miss Travers smiled roguishly: "Why should you want to know, Kate, if you disapprove of her revelations?" "Oh," with visible annoyance, "it is to--I wanted to know so as to let you see that it was something unfounded, as usual." "She said she had just been told that the colonel was going to give a dinner-party this evening to Mr. Hayne." "What?" "She--said--she--had--just--been--told--that--the colonel--was going--to give--a dinner-party--this evening--to Mr.--Hayne." "Who told her?" "Kate, I didn't ask." "Who are invited? None of _ours_?" "Kate, I don't know." "Where did she say she had heard it?" "She didn't say." Mrs. Rayner paused one moment, irresolute: "Didn't she tell you anything more about it?" "Nothing, sister mine. Why should you feel such an interest in what Mrs. Waldron says, if she's such a gossip?" And Miss Travers was evidently having hard work to keep from laughing outright. "_You_ had better write your letter," said her big sister, and flounced suddenly out of the room and up the stairs. A moment later she was at the parlor door with a wrap thrown over her shoulders: "If Captain Rayner comes in, tell him I want particularly to see him before he goes out again." "Where are you going, Kate?" "Oh, just over to Mrs. Waldron's a moment." IV.