ey Blake took the old town
hall and put a notice in the paper saying he would give a talk there on
American History in the administration of George Washington. He would
speak in English and parts of the lecture would be translated, if
necessary, by an able interpreter. Ladies considered seriously whether
they ought not to go, to encourage him, and his father was sure it was
his own right and privilege. But Jeff choked that off. He settled the
matter at the supper table.

"Look here," said he, "I'm going down there to make an ass of myself.
Don't you come. I won't have it."

So the three stayed at home, and sat up for him and he told them, when
he came in, at a little after ten, that there had been five Italians
present and one of them had slept. Two ladies, deputed by the Woman's
Club, had also come, and he wished to thunder women would mind their
business and stay at home. But there was the fighting glint in his eye.
His father remembered it, and Lydia was learning to know it now. He
would give his next lecture, he said, unless nobody was there but the
Woman's Club. He drew the line. And next day Lydia slipped away to
Madame Beattie and told her the second lecture would be on the following
Wednesday night.

That night Jeff stood up before his audience of three, no ladies this
time. But Andrea was not there. Jeff thought a minute and decided there
was no need of him.

"Will you tell me," said he, looking down from the shallow platform at
his three men, "why I'm not talking in English anyway? You vote, don't
you? You read English. Well, then, listen to it."

But he was not permitted to begin at once. There was a stir without and
the sound of feet. The door opened and men tramped in, men and men,
more than the little hall would hold, and packed themselves in the
aisles and at the back. And with the foremost, one who carried himself
proudly as if he were extremely honored, came Madame Beattie in a
long-tailed velvet gown with a shining gold circlet across her forehead,
and a plethora of jewels on her ungloved hands. She kept straight on,
and mounted the platform beside Jeff, and there she bowed to her
audience and was cheered. When she spoke to Jeff, it was with a perfect
self-possession, an implied mastery of him and the event.

"I'll interpret."

After all, why not fall in with her, old mistress of guile? He began
quite robustly and thought he was doing very well. In twenty minutes he
was, he thought, speaking e