"Stroll," cried Tom. "I call it a chase. And you could catch a deer almost as easily as to keep up with Miss Lou." "Why, Mr. Tom, I didn't walk fast." "Oh," he rejoined, "you didn't walk at all. You flitted." His aunt looked at him. "Tom, dear, don't be extravagant." "Extravagant! That's the reason father let me come up here. So I couldn't be extravagant." "He is determined to be literal," she said with a sigh. Lou gathered up a handful of flowers that lay in Mrs. Mayfield's lap. "Let me have these," and she began to weave them into the city woman's hair. "Why, daughter," cried Margaret, "don't do that. She mout not like it." "Oh, don't stop her, please," Mrs. Mayfield replied, and then to Jim she added: "Did you ever have a fawn touch you with its velvety lip? The thrill of innocence, the--" "Auntie, don't be extravagant," Tom broke in, and Lou gave him a look of tender reproof. "I wish you'd hush, Mr. Tom. I like to hear her talk." "Why--why don't you like to hear me talk?" "I do except when you interrupt her." He hung his head. "Thank you. Wishes should be sacred when set to music." "A very pretty speech," said Mrs. Mayfield, nodding Tom a compliment, and Margaret, not to be left behind, declared: "Oh, he couldn't be pearter if he tried." "There," exclaimed the girl, patting Mrs. Mayfield's head, "you are in bloom." "She was the moment you said so," Tom replied. "Do you think so?" "Yes, I know it. She burst into bloom the moment you spoke." "Then I'm glad I said it. Some how you always make me feel glad when I've said somethin'. You are the only--only people that ever did that." Jim had not spoken. Mrs. Mayfield asked him why he was so silent. "A man is sometimes most silent when he is afraid of saying too much," he answered, looking down. "Mysterious wisdom," she mused, and this gave Tom his opportunity. "Well, that's what you like, Auntie. You never did care for anything you could understand." "I don't care for impertinence, sir," and Lou laughed at him: "There, you got it that time." "Ma'm, I have no desire to be mysterious," said Jim. "A hay stack in an open field couldn't be plainer than my life up to now, but there comes a time even in the most honest man's life when he feels that he must hide something, and that something is the fact that he does feel." "There, auntie," cried Tom, "he has given you enough mystery to last you--fifteen minutes." "Is it too warm in here?" Margaret inquired, getting up and going toward the door. They told her that it was "very pleasant," and she looked around at them as if in her opinion it was getting fairly warm but not quite warm enough. "Mr. Reverend," said Mrs. Mayfield, "I have never known a man like you. And did you ever have a fight, being a Starbuck?" "I have seen men fall down." "But you never killed anybody, did you--still being a Starbuck?" "Kill anybody!" Tom cried. "Why, he's a D. D. not an M. D."