it was not extravagant."

"Oh, what a boy it is!" sighed Helen, with a little gesture of despair.
"Then, last Christmas, Ronnie, you insisted upon feting the old people
with all kinds of unnecessary luxuries. They had always been quite
content with wholesome bread-and-butter, plum cake, and nice hot tea.
They did not require _pate de foie gras_ and champagne, nor did they
understand or really enjoy them. One old lady, in considerable distress,
confided to me the fact that the champagne tasted to her 'like physic
with a fizzle in it.' It made most of them ill, Ronnie, and cost at
least eight times as much as my simple Christmas parties of other years.
So don't go and spend an unnecessary sum on an elaborate, and probably
less useful, instrument. I will write you full particulars when the time
comes. Oh, Ronnie, you will be so nearly home, by then! How shall I
wait?"

"I shall love to feel I have something to do for you in Leipzig," said
Ronnie; "and I enjoy poking about among crowds of queer instruments. I
should like to have played in Nebuchadnezzar's band. I should have
played the sackbut, because I haven't the faintest notion how you work
the thing--whether you blow into it, or pull it in and out, or tread
upon it; nor what manner of surprising sound it emits, when you do any
or all of these things. I love springing surprises on myself and on
other people; and I know I do best the things which, if I considered the
matter beforehand, I shouldn't have the veriest ghost of a notion how to
set about doing. That, darling, is inspiration! I should have played
the sackbut by inspiration; whereupon Nebuchadnezzar would instantly
have had me cast into the burning fiery furnace."

"Oh, Ronnie, I wish I could laugh! But to-morrow is so near. What shall
I do when there is nobody here to tell me silly stories?"

"Ask Mademoiselle Victorine to try her hand at it. Say: 'Chere
Mademoiselle, s'il-vous-plait, racontez-moi une extremement sotte
histoire.'"

"Ronnie, do stop chaffing! Go and play me something really beautiful,
and sing very softly, as you did the other night; so that I can hear the
tones of the piano and your voice vibrating together."

"No," said Ronnie, "I can't. I have a cast-iron lump in my throat just
now, and not a note could pass it. Besides, I don't really play the
piano."

He stretched out his foot, and kicked a log into the fire.

The flame shot up, illumining the room. The log-fire, and the two
seat