"Suppose we don't let them hang anybody while we're running the state," suggested Ardmore; "it's almost as though you murdered a man yourself, and I couldn't tie my neckties afterwards without a guilty feeling. I can't imagine anything more disagreeable than to be hanged. I heard all of _Tristan und Isolde_ once, and I have seen half an Ibsen play, and those were hard things to bear, but I suppose hanging would be just as painful and there would be no supper afterwards to cheer you up." "You shouldn't speak in that tone of _Afterwards_, Mr. Ardmore," said Jerry severely. "It isn't religious. And while we're on the subject of religion, may I ask the really, truly wherefore of Miss Daisy Waters' sudden return to Newport?" and Jerry's tone and manner were carelessly demure. "She went home," replied Ardmore, grinning; "she left Ardsley for two reasons, one of which she stated at the breakfast table and the other she handed me privately." "She said at the breakfast table that she was called home by incipient whooping cough in the household of her brother-in-law's cousin's family." "As she has no brother-in-law, that can not be true. What she said to me privately was that the house party had grown very much larger than Mrs. Atchison had originally planned it, and that I am so busy that so many guests must be a burden." Jerry stroked her cheek reflectively. "I thought Miss Waters wouldn't last long after I asked her if rusty nail water really would remove freckles. My own freckles are exactly seven in number and I am not ashamed of them, but Miss Waters seemed very sensitive on the subject, though I thought her freckles useful in diverting attention from her drugstore hair." "Did you say seven?" inquired Ardmore, gazing eagerly into Jerry's face. "I make it only six, and there's one away over there under your left eye that seems very lonesome, as though it suffered keenly from being so far away from its brothers and sisters on the other side of your nose." "Mr. Ardmore"--and Jerry again indicated the person addressed by pointing with the paper-cutter--"Mr. Ardmore, it is downright impudent of you to talk to me about my appearance in any terms, but when you speak of my face as though it were a map in a geography and of my freckles as though they were county seats, or lakes, or strange places in China, then I must protest with all my strength. If you don't change the subject immediately I shall refuse to pardon this person who killed the painless dentist, and he shall be hanged by the neck till he be dead; and you, Mr. Thomas Ardmore, will be guilty of his murder." The discussion of Miss Jerry Dangerfield's freckles ceased abruptly on the appearance of Big Paul, the forester.