n the rail behind and buried her head in
them, her lovely shoulders jiggling up and down, her sobbing laughter
sending her off at last into a spell of coughing.

"Oh!" she breathed, lifting at last her gloriously blushing face and
dabbing at it with her ridiculous little handkerchief, "oh, you'll
_kill_ me--I know you will!"

I certainly had stirred her up, and I was delighted. It _was_ funny to
think of any one calling the frump beautiful--it must seem funnier still
to her, of course--to Frances, I mean. Why, dash it, _she_ seemed to
find a funny side to it that I didn't, don't you know!

"Tell me, now"--she clasped her knee, lifting her lovely face
coaxingly--"tell me all that she said about me--_everything_!"

And I did--every word, by Jove!

And no one could look into that sweet, ingenuous face as I proceeded,
and doubt that the slanders were new to her. Never a jolly one touched
her--only you could see their absurdity amused her. Several times I had
to pause as she bent under a gale of laughter.

Only once was she brought up, shocked.

"Oh!" she uttered faintly, as I came to the intimation about her being
hail-fellow-well-met with the footmen and her drinking and carousing
with them and other men-servants until three in the morning. I realized
that it wasn't the matter of the drinking that feazed her and drew from
her little gasps as I came to this--knew _that_ didn't bother her, don't
you know, for I knew she did drink--_could_ drink, I mean to say; for I
had not forgotten the two full whisky glasses of high-proof Scotch she
had tossed off that night in my rooms. Why, no, dash it, she was _able_
to drink--it went in the family! I could never forget with what pride
she had told me of putting her brother Jack under the table two nights
running. _That_ was all right--it was the other part of the frump's
scandal that brought her up, standing, so to speak.

For _now_ she really looked embarrassed, despite another lapse to
laughter. Her face and neck were dyed a lovely crimson.

"Oh, dear!" she said finally; and she wiped her eyes. "_What_ you must
think of me!"--and she looked away, a pretty frown contracting her face;
then the jolly dimple deepened once again and she choked into her
handkerchief. "Oh, _dear_!" she repeated, biting her lip to hold her
quivering mouth corners. "Oh, it's a shame," I heard her mutter; "I
_mustn't_ let him--it's too--" She wheeled upon me, her lips tightened.
"Oh!" she ejaculated