“Not if he’s to attend the show himself,” Palmer admitted. “All the same, the father can’t come on in knickerbockers. I’ll lend Jim my Sunday things.” “But they’re grey, and quite a light grey.” “That doesn’t matter: all you want is longs.” Ann, who was nothing if not practical, said, “I think we’d better go at once and ask Aunt Caroline; because if we can’t get the things to dress up in there’s no use bothering about words.” “Right-o. But don’t say what piece we’re going to do. That’s to be a surprise. Just tell her it’s a play we’re composing ourselves.” Ann and Barbara were dispatched on this important mission, while the four boys went down to the back drawing-room to see what could be arranged in the way of stage effects. There were at all events curtains which could be drawn, and the first and last scenes presented little difficulty. The trouble was to prepare a wood for Reginald and Captain De Lancy to quarrel in. “We’ll just have to put down a few plants and things here and there; and we can have a notice saying Trespassers Prosecuted. It won’t be a long act anyway. You can have Jim’s pistol.” “I’ve used up all the caps,” said Jim. “That’s a nuisance: we want something to make a bit of a noise.” The scenic arrangements, though simple, occupied a considerable time, and still more was taken up by the sorting and allocation of the various garments Ann and Barbara had managed to collect. Moreover, Barbara now wished to take the part of Angelina, seeing how much more this lady was to be in the picture than the fascinating Maud Vivien. She tried persuasions first, and then more forcible methods, but Ann stoutly refused to make an exchange. In this she was backed up by her brothers, whose masculine sense of fair play was not to be overruled even by Barbara’s threat that she would withdraw altogether. “If you don’t want to act,” said Edward, “you needn’t. Jim can do Maud Vivien, and we can cut out the father.” All this caused delay, and when the actual composition of the drama began it was already nearly teatime; nor did it then, save in Palmer’s case perhaps, get much beyond the stage of pencil sharpening and mutual observation. Jim, to whom all forms of literary composition were a matter of considerable physical effort, lay flat on his stomach on the carpet, a sheet of foolscap before him, upon which he traced laboriously, and with much deep breathing, certain cryptic sentences. Ann’s muse had not yet descended. With one hand toying with her pigtail, she sat sucking a pencil, while her eyes rolled from collaborator to collaborator, in helpless perplexity. Then the point of Jim’s pencil broke and he scrambled to his feet. “How much have you done?” asked Palmer. “Duck all. I’m going to _think_ my part.”