ral waters" were copiously
poured from bottles wrapped, for some reason, in napkins, and proved
wholly satisfactory to almost all of the guests. And certainly no wine
could have inspired more turbulent good spirits in the host. Not even
Bibbs was an alloy in this night's happiness, for, as Mrs. Sheridan had
said, he had "plans for Bibbs"--plans which were going to straighten out
some things that had gone wrong.

So he pounded the table and boomed his echoes of old songs, and then,
forgetting these, would renew his friendly railleries, or perhaps,
turning to Mary Vertrees, who sat near him, round the corner of the
table at his right, he would become autobiographical. Gentlemen less
naive than he had paid her that tribute, for she was a girl who inspired
the autobiographical impulse in every man who met her--it needed but the
sight of her.

The dinner seemed, somehow, to center about Mary Vertrees and the
jocund host as a play centers about its hero and heroine; they were the
rubicund king and the starry princess of this spectacle--they paid court
to each other, and everybody paid court to them. Down near the
sugar Pump Works, where Bibbs sat, there was audible speculation and
admiration. "Wonder who that lady is--makin' such a hit with the old
man." "Must be some heiress." "Heiress? Golly, I guess I could stand it
to marry rich, then!"

Edith and Sibyl were radiant: at first they had watched Miss Vertrees
with an almost haggard anxiety, wondering what disasterous effect
Sheridan's pastoral gaieties--and other things--would have upon her,
but she seemed delighted with everything, and with him most of all.
She treated him as if he were some delicious, foolish old joke that
she understood perfectly, laughing at him almost violently when he
bragged--probably his first experience of that kind in his life. It
enchanted him.

As he proclaimed to the table, she had "a way with her." She had,
indeed, as Roscoe Sheridan, upon her right, discovered just after the
feast began. Since his marriage three years before, no lady had bestowed
upon him so protracted a full view of brilliant eyes; and, with the
look, his lovely neighbor said--and it was her first speech to him--

"I hope you're very susceptible, Mr. Sheridan!"

Honest Roscoe was taken aback, and "Why?" was all he managed to say.

She repeated the look deliberately, which was noted, with a
mystification equal to his own, by his sister across the table. No one,
reflec