boys, a game in which I for the nonce was a
fleeing Indian brave, led to an abrupt encounter with Mrs.
Carville. Benvenuto Cellini's scalp already hung at my girdle,
visible as a pocket-handkerchief; and he lay far down near the
cabbages, to the imaginative eye a writhing and disgusting
spectacle. The intrepid Giuseppe Mazzini, however, had thrown his
lariat about me with no mean adroitness, and I was down and
captured. This thrilling _denouement_ was enacted near the repaired
fence, and any horror I may have simulated was suddenly made real
by the appearance of Mrs. Carville, who had been feeding her fowls.
When one is prone on the grass, a clothes-line drawn tight about
one's arms, and a triumphant cow-boy of eight years in the very act
of placing his foot on one's neck, it is difficult to look
dignified. The sudden intrusion of an unsympathetic personality
will banish the romantic illusion.

It may be that the sombre look in Mrs. Carville's face was merely
expressive of a doubt of my sanity. For a grown man to be playing
with two little boys at three o'clock of a Tuesday afternoon, may
have seemed bizarre enough in her view. To me, however,
endeavouring to disengage myself from my conqueror and assume an
attitude in keeping with my age and reputation, her features were
ominously shadowed by displeasure.

"If I disturbed you," I said courteously, "I am sorry."

She put her hand on the paling and the basket slid down her arm.
She seemed to be pondering whether I had disturbed her or no,
eyeing me reflectively. Ben came up, no longer a scalped and
abandoned cow-boy, but a delighted child. Perhaps the trust and
frank _camaraderie_ of the little fellow's attitude towards me
affected her, for her face softened.

"It's all right," she replied slowly. "You must not let them
trouble you. They make so much noise."

"No, no," I protested. "I enjoy it. I am fond of children, very
fond. They are nice little boys."

They stood on either side of me, clutching at my coat, subdued by
the conversation.

"You have not any children?" she asked, looking at them. I shook my
head.

"I am a bachelor," I replied, "I am sorry to say."

"That accounts for it," she commented, raising her eyes to mine. I
agreed.

"Possibly," I said. "None the less I like them. I suppose," I
added, "they ought to be at school."

"There is measles everywhere in the school," she informed me. "I do
not want it yet."

"Mr. Carville," I said, seizin