ing any pretence," said she, sharply. "You know
quite well why you are making that salad dressing."

"Did you never see me make salad dressing before?" said the other, quite
as sharply.

"You know it is simply because Sir Keith Macleod is coming to lunch. I
forgot all about it. Oh, and that's why you had the clean curtains put
up yesterday?"

What else had this precocious brain ferreted out?

"Yes, and that's why you bought papa a new necktie," continued the
tormenter; and then she added, triumphantly, "_But he hasn't put it on
this morning, ha--Gerty?_"

A calm and dignified silence is the best answer to the fiendishness of
thirteen. Miss White went on with the making of the salad-dressing. She
was considered very clever at it. Her father had taught her: but he
never had the patience to carry out his own precepts. Besides, brute
force is not wanted for the work: what you want is the self-denying
assiduity and the dexterous light-handedness of a woman.

A smart young maid-servant, very trimly dressed, made her appearance.

"Sir Keith Macleod, miss," said she.

"Oh, Gerty, you're caught!" muttered the fiend.

But Miss White was equal to the occasion. The small white fingers plied
the fork without a tremor.

"Ask him to step this way, please," she said.

And then the subtle imagination of this demon of thirteen jumped to
another conclusion.

"Oh, Gerty, you want to show him that you are a good housekeeper--that
you can make salad--"

But the imp was silenced by the appearance of Macleod himself. He
looked tall as he came through the small drawing-room. When he came out
onto the balcony the languid air of the place seemed to acquire a fresh
and brisk vitality: he had a bright smile and a resonant voice.

"I have taken the liberty of bringing you a little present, Miss
White--no, it is a large present--that reached me this morning," said
he. "I want you to see one of our Highland salmon. He is a splendid
fellow--twenty-six pounds four ounces, my landlady says. My cousin Janet
sent him to me."

"Oh, but, Sir Keith, we cannot rob you," Miss White said, as she still
demurely plied her fork. "If there is any special virtue in a Highland
salmon, it will be best appreciated by yourself, rather than by those
who don't know."

"The fact is," said he, "people are so kind to me that I scarcely ever
am allowed to dine at my lodgings; and you know the salmon should be
cooked at once."

Miss Carry had been making