We breakfasted on soupaan, new milk, johnnycake, and troutlings caught by Colas, who had gone by canoe to the outlet of Hans' Creek by daylight, after I had awakened him. Which showed me how easily one could escape from the Summer House, in spite of guards patrolling the neck and mainland road. We were four at table; Lady Johnson, Claudia, Penelope, and I; and all seemed to be in better humour, for Claudia's bright eyes were ever roaming toward the Continental camp, where smart officers passed and repassed in the bright sunlight; and Lady Johnson did not conceal her increasing conviction that Sir John had got clean away; which, naturally, pleased the poor child mightily;--and Penelope, who had offered very simply to serve us at table, sat silent and contented by the civil usage she received from Polly Johnson, who told her very sweetly that her place was in a chair and not behind it. "For," said my lady, "a parson's daughter may serve where her heart directs, but is nowise or otherwise to be unclassed." "Were I obliged by circumstances to labour for my bread," said Claudia, "would you still entertain honourable though ardent sentiments toward me, Jack?" Which saucy question I smiled aside, though it irritated me, and oddly, too, because Penelope Grant had heard--though why I should care a farthing for that I myself could not understand. Lady Johnson laid a hand on Penelope's, who looked up at her with that shy, engaging smile I had already noticed. And, "Penelope," said she, "if rumour does not lie, and if all our young gallants do truly gather 'round when you take your knitting to the porch of Cayadutta Lodge, then you should make it very plain to all that you are a parson's daughter as well as servant to Douw Fonda." "How should I conduct, my lady?" "Firmly, child. And send any light o' love a-packing at the first apropos!" "Oh, lud!" says Claudia, "would you make a nun of her, Polly? Sure the child must learn----" "Learn to take care of herself," quoth Polly Johnson tartly. "You have been schooled from childhood, Claudia, and heaven knows you have had opportunities enough to study that beast called man!" "I love him, too," said Claudia. "Do you, Penelope?" "Men please me," said the Scotch girl shyly. "I do not think them beasts." "They bite," snapped Lady Johnson. "Slap them," said Claudia,--"and that is all there is to it." "You think any man ever has been tamed and the beast cast out of him, even after marriage?" demanded Lady Johnson. She smiled, but I caught the undertone of bitterness in her gaiety, poor girl! "Before marriage," said Claudia coolly, "man is exactly as treacherous as he is afterward;--no more so, no less. What about it? You take the creature as he is fashioned by his Maker, or you drive him away and live life like a cloistered nun. What is your choice, Penelope?" "I have no passion for a cloister," replied the girl, so candidly that all laughed, and she blushed prettily.