"Say, you're a consistent grouch, ain't you?" says I, givin' him the grin. "What's the particular trouble--was you toppin' your drive to-day?" "Slicin', mon," says he. "Hardly a tee shot found the fairway the whole round. And then you two come breaking me bushes." "My error," says I. "But you should have hung out a sign that you was inside chewin' nails." "I was doing nothing of the kind," says he. "I was waiting for that grinning idiot, Len Hung, to give me me tea." "Well, don't choke over it when you do get it," says I. "And if you ain't ready to sic the police on us we'll be trotting along back." "Ye wull not," says MacGregor; "ye'll have tea with me." It sounds like a threat, and I can see Vee gettin' ready to object strenuous. So I gives her the nudge. I expect it's because I'm so used to Old Hickory's blowin' out a fuse that I don't duck quicker when a gas-bomb disposition begins to sputter around. They don't mean half of it, these furious fizzers. Sometimes it's sciatica, more often a punk digestion, and seldom pure cussedness. If you don't humor 'em by comin' back messy yourself, but just jolly 'em along, they're apt to work out of it. And I'd seen sort of a human flicker in them blue-gray eyes of MacGregor Shinn's. "Vee," says I, "our peevish friend is invitin' us to take tea with him. Shall we chance it?" And you know what a good sport Vee is. She lets the curve come into her mouth corners again, both of her cheek dimples show, and she shoots a quizzin' smile at Mr. Shinn. "Does he say it real polite?" she asks. "Na," says MacGregor. "But there'll be hot scones and marmalade." "M-m-m-m!" says Vee. "Let's, Torchy." It's an odd finish to an affair that started so scrappy. Not that Shinn reverses himself entirely, or turns from a whiskered golf grump into a stage fairy in spangled skirts. He goes right on with his growlin' and grumblin'--about the way his Chink cook serves the tea, about havin' to live in a rotten hole like Harbor Hills, about everything in general. But a great deal of it is just to hear himself talk, I judge. We had a perfectly good high tea, and them buttered scones with marmalade couldn't be beat. Also he shows us all over the house, and Vee raves about it. "Look, Torchy!" says she. "That glimpse of water from the living-room windows. Isn't that dear? And one could have such a wonderful garden beyond. Such a splendid big fireplace, too. And what huge beams in the ceiling! It's a very old house, isn't it, Mr. Shinn?"