Miss Calthea Rose, who had accepted Mrs. Petter's invitation to spend the night,--for if ever she was going to do anything at the Squirrel Inn, this was the time to do it,--did not like Mrs. Cristie's politeness, and her conversation did not sparkle. In fact she was quieter than Mr. Lodloe, and paid little heed to the chatter of her neighbor, Lanigan Beam. This young man was dissatisfied. There was a place at the table that was sometimes filled and sometimes not filled. At present it was empty. [Illustration: MRS. CRISTIE CONSIDERS.] "I cannot see," said he, speaking to the company in general, "why babies are not brought to the table. I think they ought to be taught from the very beginning how to behave themselves at meals." Mr. Petter fixed his eyes upon him, and, speaking through the young man, also addressed the company. "I'm not altogether in favor of having small children at the table," said he. "Their food is different from ours, and their ways are often unpleasant; but I do think--" "No, you don't," interrupted Mrs. Petter from the other end of the table--"you don't think anything of the kind. That has all been fixed and settled, and there's no use in bringing it up again." Mr. Petter looked at his wife with a little flash in his eye, but he spoke quietly. "There are some things," he said, "that can be unfixed and unsettled." Mrs. Cristie hastened to stop this discussion. "As I own the only baby in the house," she said, with a smile, "I may as well say that it is not coming to the table either by itself or in any other way." A thought now tickled Mr. Tippengray. Without any adequate reason whatever, there came before him the vision of an opossum which he once had seen served at a Virginia dinner-table, plump and white, upon a china dish. And he felt almost irresistibly impelled to lean forward and ask Mr. Lodloe if he had ever read any of the works of Mr. Jonathan Carver, that noted American traveler of the last century; but he knew it wouldn't do, and he restrained himself. If he had thought Lodloe would understand him he would have made his observation in Greek, but even that would have been impolite to the rest of the company. So he kept his joke to himself, and, for fear that any one should perceive his amusement, he asked Mrs. Petter if she had ever noticed how much finer was the fur of a cat which slept out of doors than that of one which had been in the house. She had noticed it, but thought that the cat would prefer a snug rug by the fire to fine fur. Calthea Rose said little and thought much. It was necessary that she should take in every possible point in the situation, and she was doing it. She did not like Mrs. Cristie's attention to Mr. Tippengray, because it gave him pleasure, and she did not wish that other women should give him pleasure; but she was not jealous, for that would have been absurd in this case.