1 1 6 Summer 



usual impetuosity, when all at once a bright look 

 flashed upon the drooping face. 



' Well, dear,' she said, ' I will when ' and at this 

 word the soft eyes began to twinkle with mischief 

 and the sweet lips to assume their sauciest curl 

 ' when. . . . when. . . . you catch that pike ! Good- 

 night ' and before I had quite recovered from the 

 shock, her light dress had disappeared into the house, 

 whence a moment after issued a single peal of soft low 

 mocking laughter. 



For a while I felt as a man feels who has been 

 ' chaffed ' and made ridiculous when he was rather 

 inclined to show off. In the darkness my face flushed 

 to think what a useless ' tailor ' their strongest term 

 of contempt I must appear to these country-people. 

 But the joke had been made in a style too pleasant 

 for it to wound deeply, and with a little effort I soon 

 rallied, but it was with a curious sense of pique. ' I 

 shall take you at your word, Lady-bird,' I said to my- 

 self on my way back to the inn ; ' they laugh best who 

 laugh last, and it will be your turn to blush when I 

 throw down that pike at your feet' How thankful I 

 felt at that moment for having brought with me some 

 books on angling ! Before going to bed I had learned 

 what each of them had to say about the pike, and 

 nothing could by any possibility have been more 

 encouraging ; ' a fresh-water shark,' said one ; ' the most 

 ravenous of river fishes,' said another ; ' will swallow 

 anything,' averred a third ; ' might be killed with a 



