to
help me, if only I could find him."

Self-restraint was no longer possible with Miss Calthea Rose. A red
blaze shot into her face, and without deigning to look in the direction
of the creature who had just spoken, she said in the sharpest tones of
contemptuous anger:

"Greek to a child's nurse! I expect next he'll teach French to the
pigs."

The maid Ida lifted up her eyes from the book and fixed them on Miss
Calthea.

"The best thing he could do," she quietly remarked, "would be to teach
the old hens good manners"; and then she walked away with her book.

Miss Calthea sprang to her feet, and looked as if she was going to do
something; but there was nothing to do, and she sat down again. Her brow
was dark, her eyes flashed, and her lips were parted, as if she was
about to say something; but there was nothing to say, and she sat
silent, breathing hard. It was bad enough to be as jealous as Miss
Calthea was at that moment, but to be so flagrantly insulted by the
object of her jealousy created in her a rage that could not be expressed
in words. It was fortunate that she did not look at Mrs. Petter, for
that good lady was doing her best to keep from laughing.

"Well!" she exclaimed, as soon as she could speak composedly, "this is
too much. I think I must speak to Mrs. Cristie about this. Of course she
can't prevent the young woman from answering back, but I think I can
make her see that it isn't seemly and becoming for nurse-maids to be
associating with boarders in this way."

[Illustration: "TEACH THE OLD HENS GOOD MANNERS."]

"If you take my advice, Susan Petter," said Miss Calthea, in a voice
thickened by her emotions, "you will keep your mouth shut on that
subject. If your boarders choose to associate with servants, let them
alone. It simply shows what sort of people they are."

Calthea Rose did not like to hear herself speak in a voice which might
show how she was feeling, and as there was no use of staying there if
she could not talk, she rose to leave, and, in spite of Mrs. Petter's
hospitable entreaty to make a longer stay, she departed.

When her visitor was well out of sight, Mrs. Petter allowed herself to
lean back in her chair and laugh quietly.

"Leave them alone indeed," she said to herself. "You may want me to do
it, but I know well enough that you are not going to leave them alone,
Miss Calthea Rose, and I can't say that I wonder at your state of mind,
for it seems to me that this is your la