rack. No, Miss Gladys, ex-cuse me, I don't give up these here
shavings till I know it's all right."

"Well, well, it _ith_ all right," exclaimed Johnnie, "we're not going to
do any harm! O Cray, he'th brought up a log ath big ath a fiddle. Quelle
alouette!"

"How lucky it is that she has never seen Cray!" exclaimed Barbara.
"Johnnie, do be calm; how are we to do it, if you laugh so? Now then,
you are to be attending to the electrifying machine."

"Swanny," asked Crayshaw, "have you got a pipe in your pocket? I want
one to lie on my desk."

"Well, now, to think o' your asking me such a question, just as if I was
ever _known_ to take so much as a whiff in working hours--no, not in
the tool-house, nor nowhere."

"But just feel. Come, you might."

"Well, now, this here is remarkable," exclaimed Swan, with a start as if
of great surprise, when, after feeling in several pockets, a pipe
appeared from the last one.

"Don't knock the ashes out."

"She's coming," said Swan, furtively glancing down, and then pretending
to nail with great diligence. "And, my word, if here isn't Miss Christie
with her!"

A great scuffle now ensued to get things ready. Barbara darted down
stairs, and what she may have said to Aunt Christie while Swan received
some final instructions above, is of less consequence than what Miss
Crampton may have felt when she found herself at the top of the stairs
in the long room, with its brown high-pitched roof--a room full of the
strangest furniture, warm with the sun of August, and sweet with the
scent of the creepers.

Gladys and Johnnie were busy at the electrifying machine, and with a
rustling and crackling noise the "spunky little flashes," as Swan called
them, kept leaping from one leaden knob to another.

Miss Crampton saw a youth sitting on a low chair, with his legs on
rather a higher one; the floor under him was strewed with shavings,
which looked, Swan thought, "as natural as life," meaning that they
looked just as if he had made them by his own proper whittling.

The youth in question was using a large pruning knife on a log that he
held rather awkwardly on his knee. He had a soft hat, which had been
disposed over one eye. Miss Crampton gave the sparks as wide a berth as
she could, and as she advanced, "Well, sir," Swan was saying in
obedience to his instructions, "if you've been brought up a republican,
I spose you can't help it. But whatever _your_ notions may be, Old
Master is staunc