“‘Who rideth so late in the forest so wild? It is the fond father and his loving child.’” “Oh, spare us, Val,” cried her sister Gillian. “Every one has done that.” “Gerald parodied mine,” said Anna. “‘Who trampeth so late in a shocking bad hat? ‘Tis the tipsy old father a-hugging his brat.” “Oh, go on.” “I can’t recollect any more, but the Erl King’s daughter is a beggar-woman, and it ends with-- “I’ll give thee a tanner and make him a bait, So in the gin palace was settled his fate.” Some of the party were scandalized, others laughed as much or more than the effusion deserved. “We accept drawings,” added another voice, “and if any one does anything extraordinarily good in that way, or in writing, it makes a little book.” “We have higher designs than that,” said Gillian. “We want to print the cream.” “For the benefit of the school board--no, the board school.” “Oh! oh! Valetta!” cried the general voice. “The thing is,” explained Gillian, “that we must build a new school for the out-liers of St. Kenelm’s, or ‘my lords’ will be down on us, and we shall be swamped by board schools.” “Aunt Jane is frantic about it,” said Dolores Mohun. “There’s no escape from school board worries!” exclaimed Anna. “They helped to demolish Uncle Clement.” “There is to be a sale of work, and a concert, and all sorts of jolly larks,” added Valetta. “Larks! Oh, Val!” “Larks aren’t slang. They are in the dictionary,” declared Valetta. “By the bye, she has not heard the rules of the Mice,” put in Mysie. “I’ll say them,” volunteered Valetta the irrepressible. “Members of the Mouse-trap never utter slang expressions, never wear live birds--I mean dead ones--in their hats.” “Is an ostrich feather a live bird or a dead?” demanded Anna. “And,” said Dolores, “what of the feather screens that the old Miss Smiths have been making all the winter-circles of pheasants’ feathers and peacocks’ eyes outside a border of drakes’ curls?” “Oh, like ostriches they don’t count, since peacocks don’t die, and drakes and pheasants _must_,” said Gillian. “We have been getting ready for this sale ever so long,” said Mysie. “Aunt Jane has a working party every Friday for it.” “The fit day,” said Dolores, “for she is a perfect victim to other people’s bad work, and spends the evening in stitching up and making presentable the wretched garments they turn out.” “The next rule--” began Valetta, but Gillian mercilessly cut her short. “You know clever people, Anna. Do you know how to manage about our Mouse-trap book? Our bookseller here is a school-board man, all on the wrong side, and when I tried to feel our way, he made out that the printing and getting it up would cost a great deal more than we could risk.” “It is a pity that Uncle Lance is gone home,” said Anna. “He could tell you all about it.” “Could you not write to him?”