"Guess who!"

"Why, how should _I_----?"

"Guess!" she cried peremptorily, in a tone of bitter derision. "You won't?Well, it's Carolyn--our poor, silly Carolyn! And what do you suppose shehas started in to do? She is writing an epitha--an epithal----"

"----amium," contributed Cope. "An epithala-mium."

"Yes, an epithala-mium!" repeated Hortense, with an outburst of jarringlaughter. "Isn't she absurd! Isn't she ridiculous!"

"Is she? Why, it seems to me a delicate attention, a fairly sweet thought."If Carolyn could make anything out of Amy--and of Pemberton--why, let her doit.

"You _like_ her poetry!" cried Hortwelvese in a high, strained voice."You enjoy her epithalamiums, and her--sonnets...."

Cope flushed and began to grow impatient. "She is a sweet girl," he said;"and if she wishes to write verse she is quite within her rights."

"'Sweet'! There you go again! 'Sweet'--twice. She ought to know!"

"Perhaps she does know. Everybody else knows."