d, and she did the same; after
which they waded in the shallow brook, and turned up flat stones in its
bed. Sometimes the crawfish lay quite still, when Mr. Bigglethorpe,
getting his right hand, with extended thumb and forefinger, slily behind
it, grasped the unsuspecting crustacean at the back of his great
nippers, and landed him in the bottle filled with sparkling water.
Sometimes a "craw," as Marjorie called them, darted away backward in a
great hurry, and had to be looked for under another stone, and these
were generally young active fellows, which, the fisherman said, made the
best bait for bass. It was wild, exciting work, with a spice of danger
in it from the chance of a nip from those terrible claws. Marjorie
enjoyed it to the full. She laughed and shrieked, and clapped her hands
over every new addition to the pickle bottle, and Mr. Biggles was every
bit as enthusiastic as she was. Soon they were aware of a third figure
on the scene. It was the sleepless lawyer. "Come in, Eugene," cried
Marjorie; "take off your shoes and stockings, and help us to catch these
lovely craws." He had to obey, and was soon as excited as the others
over this novel kind of sport.

Coristine looked up after securing his twelfth victim, and saw four
figures sauntering down the hill. Three were young ladies in print
morning gowns; the fourth was the ineffable dude, Lamb. At once he went
back, and put himself into socks and boots, turning down his trouser
legs, as if innocent of the childish amusement. "Haw," brayed Mr. Lamb,
"is thot you, Cawrstine? Been poddling in the wotter, to remind yoursolf
of the doys when you used to run round in your bare feet?" Outwardly
calm, the lawyer advanced to meet the invaders. Bowing somewhat too
ceremoniously to the three ladies, who looked delightfully fresh and
cool in their morning toilets, he answered his interlocutor. "I am sure,
Mr. Lamb, that it would afford Mr. Bigglethorpe and Marjorie additional
satisfaction, to know that their wading after crawfish brought up
memories of your barefooted youth. Unfortunately, I have no such
blissful period to recall." Mr. Lamb blushed, and stammered some
incoherencies, and Miss Carmichael, running past the lawyer towards
Marjorie, whispered as she flitted before him, "you rude, unkind man!"
This did not tend to make him more amiable. He snubbed the Crown Land
gentleman at every turn, and, more than usually brilliant in talk,
effectually kept his adversary out