"O Mrs. Clinton I am so glad to see you back," she said, almost ecstatically, "and you too Cicely dear--oh my a new hat and such a pretty one! You look quite the town lady, upon my word and how did you enjoy the ball? you must tell me all about it every word now Joan and Nancy I will not put away your things for you once more and that I declare and you hear me say it you are the most shockingly untidy children and if I have told you that once I have told you a hundred times O Mrs. Clinton a new bonnet too and I declare it makes you look five years younger _at_ least." Mrs. Clinton took this compliment equably, and asked if the twins had been good girls. "Well, good!" echoed the old starling, "they know best whether they have been good, of their lessons I say nothing and marks will show, but to get up as you might say in the dead of the night and let themselves down from a window with sheets twisted into a rope and not fit to be seen since, all creased, _most_ dangerous, besides the impropriety for great girls of thirteen if any one had been passing as I have told them and should be _obliged_ to report this behaviour to you Mrs. Clinton on the first opportunity." Joan and Nancy both glanced at their mother tentatively. "We were only playing Jacobites and Roundheads," said Joan. "It makes it more real." "And it wasn't in the middle of the night," added Nancy. "It was four o'clock, and quite light." "Why, you might have killed yourselves!" exclaimed Cicely. "_Exactly_ what I said the very words," corroborated the old starling. "We tied the sheets very tight," said Joan. "And tested them thoroughly," added Nancy. "And we won't do it again, mother," said Joan coaxingly. "Really, we won't," said Nancy impressively. "But what else will you do?" asked Mrs. Clinton. "You are getting too big for these pranks. If your father were to hear of it, I am sure I don't know what he would say." She knew pretty well that he would have laughed boisterously, and told her that he didn't want the children molly-coddled. Time enough for that by and by when they grew up. And the twins probably knew this too, and were not unduly alarmed at the implied threat. But there was a quality in their mother's displeasure, rare as it was, which made them apprehensive when one of their periodical outbursts had come to light. They were not old enough to perceive that it was not aroused by such feats as the one under discussion, which showed no moral delinquency, but only a certain danger to life and limb, now past. But their experience did tell them that misbehaviour which caused her displeasure was not thus referred to their father, and with many embraces and promises of amendment they procured future oblivion of their escapade.