to shake Isabel Rose. She could watch her young lover's emotions
with the same diverted interest with which she had watched the struggles
of the tiny black-and-scarlet beetle drowning in her finger-bowl.

"I wish you had been with us, Corrie," was all Gerard found to say.

Through the parted curtains, the library presented such a graceful
interior study as certain French artists have delighted in drawing. In
the octagonal, book-lined room of rich hues and soft lights, Flavia and
her father were seated together; busied in pleasant comradeship at the
table whose polished surface was littered with letters, books of
household accounts, and all those dainty metal and crystal trinkets the
jeweller conceives necessary to the writer. Evidently they had found
refreshment desirable, for a diminutive tea-table still stood near
Flavia, while a pushed-back chair beneath which a young Great Dane hound
lay asleep indicated that Corrie had been one of the group.

"Back, are you?" Mr. Rose called cheerily, to the two in the hall,
leaning back in his chair to view them more easily. "When I heard where
you were marooned, I guessed it was about time for a rescue. You
children oughtn't to try roundabout country roads with a storm blowing
up."

"Mr. Gerard wanted to go that way," Isabel alleged, with perfect
assurance. "I told him to do as he chose."

That distortion of facts was too much to be endured, with Corrie
listening and Flavia a witness. Gerard's chivalry momentarily lapsed
and he struck back with all the effectiveness of superior experience.

"Yes, certainly," he confirmed, carefully distinct. "I naturally wanted
to get Miss Rose safely at home as soon as possible, and since she said
that road was the shortest route, I took it, of course."

"The _shortest_?" Corrie echoed, astounded. "The----"

He broke the speech in time, hastily discreet. Isabel crimsoned hotly;
the glance she darted at her late escort was not dovelike. It was Flavia
who brought relief to the situation, as usual.

"These Long Island roads are outrageously misleading," she offered light
suggestion, rising with a smiling gesture of excuse to her father. "Isa
and I often lose our way when we drive out together. Don't you want to
change your damp things, dear?"

"Yes," assented her cousin, sullenly. "It's time to make ready for
dinner, anyhow."

Corrie held aside the curtain for the girls to pass out. His blue eyes
were dancing in pure mischief and relie