spirited fashion, slopping his tea.

Everybody turned to look in our direction.

"Duck," hissed Mops.

But it was too late to duck. Several ladies were already sweeping towards
us.

Then my soul fainted within me, for the voice of the being who ruled our
little universe spoke as from a dark cloud.

"David! John! Alexander!" gobbled the Voice, "are you gone mad? Come here
instantly--but no--you appear to be nude--answer me--are you nude?"

Mops answered for us; we were too afflicted for speech.

"If you mean naket, we're not," she said, "but the dressed-up part of us is
on this side."

I was conscious of murmuring voices: What a terrible little girl; indeed
the whole family; as for the mother--Yes--my pupils, and, for the present,
my wards--Once they even threw a dead rat over!

Then up spoke Mrs. Handsomebody. "Put on your clothes," she ordered, "and
meet me at the corner. I shall be waiting."

IV

We had put on our clothes. We had met her but, good Heaven! what a
Rendezvous! She, and Angel, and I were pallid with suppressed emotions,
while The Seraph's face was flushed crimson. He was weeping loudly, as he
followed in our wake, and walking with some difficulty, since Angel and I,
in our agitation, had put his trousers on back to front.

Mrs. Handsomebody placed us in a row, on three chairs in the dining-room,
and seated herself opposite to us. After removing her bonnet, and giving it
to Mary Ellen to carry upstairs to the wardrobe, she said:

"If I believed that you realized the enormity of what you have done, I
should write to South America to your father, and tell him that I would no
longer undertake the responsibility of three boys so evilly inclined. What
do you suppose my sensations were when, at the close of the lecture, the
other ladies, the professor, our pastor, and myself adjourned to the garden
for tea, to find you three perched, almost nude, on a wall, in such
company?"

"Do you know that those people are not respectable? The man, I am told, is
a rake, who attends cockfights, and the mother of those children has been
seen in the garden--_tight_!"

"Was that the lady in pink satin?" asked Angel, showing interest for the
first time.

"I daresay. One would expect to find her in pink satin."

The lecture went on, but I did not hear it; my mind dwelt insistently on
thoughts of the lady in pink.

"What did she do, please?" I interrupted, thoughtlessly, at last.

"Who do?"

"The lady.