schief.

"Oh, I often go to see Daly. I want him to come fishing with me
to-morrow: he's the best man about here for that, and trudges behind one
for miles without complaining."

"Poor Daly!"

"Well, I hope you enjoyed your visit to-day," says Kit, blithely,
glancing at him mischievously from beneath her broad hat.

"There was a drawback," says Brian, unthinkingly. "I went there full of
hope, and, after all, she never offered me any of your pudding!"

Tableau!

Kit's agonized glance and Monica's questioning eyes awake Mr. Desmond to
a knowledge of what he has done.

"How did _you_ hear of Kit's pudding?" asks Monica, looking keenly from
Brian to Kit, and then back again.

"Oh!--the pudding," stammers Desmond.

"There! don't commit yourself," says Monica, in a tone that trembles.
"Oh, Kit!"

Both culprits are afraid to look at her. Does the tremble mean tears, or
anger, or what? Perhaps horror at their duplicity, or contempt. Is she
hopelessly angered?

Then a suppressed sound reaches their ears, creating a fresh panic in
their breasts. Is she positively _choking_ with indignation? Cautiously,
anxiously, they glance at her, and find, to their everlasting relief,
that she is convulsed with laughter.

"When next you meditate forming a brilliant plot such as this," she says
to Kit, "I think I should look out a more trustworthy accomplice if I
were you."

"Catch me having a secret with _him_ again," says Kit now her fears are
appeased, turning wrathfully upon Desmond.

"I quite forgot all about it, I did, indeed," exclaims he, penitently.
"Forgive me this time, and I'll promise never to do it again."

"And I'll promise you you shan't have the chance," says Kit, with
fervor.

"_Why_ was I to be deceived?" says Monica. "I think I have been very
basely treated. If you, Kit, desired a clandestine meeting with Mr.
Desmond, I don't see why _I_ was to be drawn into it. And it was a
stupid arrangement, too: two is company, three trumpery. I know, if I
had a lover, I should prefer----"

"Monica!" says Kit, indignantly; but Monica only laughs the more.

"It is _my_ turn now, you know," she says.

"Kit had nothing to do with it: it was all my fault," says Desmond,
laughing too. "If you must pour out the vials of your wrath on some one,
let it be on me."

"Yes, give him a good scolding, Monica," says Kit viciously, but with a
lovely smile. "I am going to pick to some ferns for Aunt Pen; when I
return I hope I