lover smiled because he heard, and Aunt Mary smiled because she didn't,
but was happy anyway. She had altogether forgotten that she had demurred
at dining out. They all sat down and shook out their napkins. Mitchell and
Clover shook Aunt Mary's for her and gave it a beautiful cornerways spread
across her lap.

Then the waiter laid another plate for Mitchell, and brought oyster
cocktails for everyone. Aunt Mary eyed hers with early curiosity and later
suspicion; and she smelled of it very carefully.

"I don't believe they're good oysters," she said.

"Yes, they are," cried Mitchell reassuringly. His voice, when he turned it
upon her, was pitched like a clarionet. The blind would surely have seen
as well as the deaf have heard had there been any candidates for miracles
in his immediate vicinity. "They're first-class," he added, "you just go
at them and see."

The reassured took another whiff.

"You can have mine," she said directly afterwards; and there was an air of
decision about her speech which brooked no opposition. Yet Mitchell
persisted.

"Oh, no," he yelled; "you must learn how. Just throw your head back and
take 'em quick--after the fashion that they eat raw eggs, don't you know?"

"But she can't," said Clover. "There's too much, particularly as she isn't
used to them. I'll tell you, Miss Watkins," he cried, hoisting his own
voice to the masthead, "you eat the oysters, and leave the cocktail.
That's the way to get gradually trained into the wheel."

Aunt Mary thought some of obeying; she fished out one oyster, wiped it
carefully with a bit of bread, regarded it with more than dubious
countenance, and then suddenly decided not to.

"I'd rather be at home when I try experiments," she said, decidedly; and
the waiter carried off her cocktail and gave her food that was good beyond
question thereafter.

The dinner went with zest. It was an enlivening party that consumed it,
and what they consumed with it enlivened them still more. The gentlemen
soon reached the point where they could laugh over jokes they could not
understand, and the one lady member became equally merry over wit that she
did not hear. She forgot for the nonce that there were any phases of life
in which she was not a believer, and whether this was owing to the
surrounding gayety or to the champagne which they persuaded her to taste
it is not my province to explain.

"Now we must lay our lines for events to come," Jack said, when they
advan