Well, Mr. and Mrs. Tevis are goats. Why? Anybody could see it after talking to either of them for five minutes; yet who could say why? It isn't because they're snobs--lots of sheep are nauseating snobs. It isn't because they're very badly self-made--I defy anybody to produce a goat that can touch Willie Catesby or Rennie Tucker, yet each of them has ancestors by the score. It isn't because they're new--the Burkes are new, yet Mrs. Burke has at least a dozen intimate acquaintances of the right sort. It isn't because they're ostentatious and boastful about wealth and prices--there are scores of sheep who make the same sort of absurd exhibition of vulgarity. I can't place it. They're just goats, and they know it, and they feel it; and when you go to their house they suggest a restaurant keeper welcoming his customers; and when they come to your house they suggest Cook's tourists roaming in the private apartments of a palace, smiling apologetically at every one and wondering whether they're not about to be told to "step lively." Mrs. Tevis received me very grandly and graciously, though dreadfully nervous withal, lest I should be seeing that she was "throwing a bluff" and should put her in her place. "I've requested you to come, my dear Miss Talltowers," she began, after she had bunglingly served tea from the newest and costliest and most elaborate tea-set I ever saw, "because I had a little matter of business to talk over with you and felt that we could talk more freely here." "I must be back at half-past five," said I, by way of urging her on to the point. "That will be quite time enough," said she. "We can have our little conversation quite nicely, and you will be in ample time for your duties." I wonder what sort of dialect she _thinks_ in. It certainly can't be more irritating than the one she translates her thoughts into before speaking them. The dialect she inflicts on people sounds as if it were from a Complete Conversationalist, got up by an old maid who had been teaching school for forty years. "I have decided to take a secretary for next season," she went on. "Not that I need any such direction as the Burkes. Fortunately, Mr. Tevis and I have had a large social experience on both sides of the Atlantic and have always moved with the best people. But just a secretary--to attend to my onerous correspondence and arrangements for entertaining. The duties would be light, but we should be willing to pay a larger salary than the position would really justify--that is, we should be willing to pay it, you know, to a _lady_ such as you are." I bowed. "We should treat you with all delicacy and appreciation of the fact that your misfortunes have compelled you to take a--a--position--which--which--" "You are very kind, Mrs. Tevis," said I. "And we realized that in all probability the Burkes would have no further use for your services at the end of this season, as you have been most successful with them."