"I can trust both of you, I to be an expert, and Cai's hope." Mrs Bosenna glanced blunders were mostly lost on towards Cai, or so Cai thought. her. But 'Bias disgraced himself before his partner, who neither reproached him nor once missed a trick. "The jokes they keep makin'!" Palmerston reported to Mrs Bowldler. (With the utmost cheerfulness he continued running to and fro between summer-house and residence under the downpour.) 66 When Mrs Bosenna said that about a merrythought I almost split myself.' "There's a medium in all things," Mrs Bowldler advised him. "Stand-offish should be your expression when waiting at table; like as if you'd heard it all before several times, no matter how funny they talk, As for splitting, I shiver at the bare thought." "Well, I didn't do it, really. I just got my hand over my mouth in time." "And what did that other woman happen to be doing?" asked Mrs Bowldler. "I partic'l'ly noticed," said Palmerston. "She was sittin' quiet and playin' with her 'am." The rain continuing, 'Bias at the close of supper sensationally produced two packs of cards and proposed that, as soon as Palmerston had removed the cloth, they should play what he called "a rubber to whist." He and Mrs Bosenna cut together; Cai with Dinah. Now, the two captains could, as a rule, play a good hand at whist. On this occasion they played so abominably as to surprise themselves and each other. Dinah did not profess "I can't tell what's come over me to-night," he confessed at the end of the second rubber. "Regatta - day!" laughed Mrs Bosenna, and pushed the cards away. The weddingring on her third finger glanced under the light of the hanging lamp. "Dinah shall tell our fortunes," she suggested. Dinah took the pack and proceeded very gravely to tell their fortunes. She began with Captain Hunken, and found that, a dark lady happening in the "second house,' he would certainly marry one of that hue, with plenty of money, and live happy ever after. She next attempted Captain Hocken's. "Well, that's funny, now!" she exclaimed, after dealing out the cards face uppermost. "What's funny?" asked Cai. "Why," said Dinah, after a long scrutiny, during which she pursed and unpursed her lips half a dozen times at least, "the cards are different, o' course, but they say the same thing-dark lady and all-and I can't make it other." "No need," said Cai cheerfully, drawing at his pipe (for Mrs Bosenna had given the pair permission to smoke). "So long as you let 'Bias an' me run on the same lines, I'm satisfied. Eh, 'Bias?" "But 'tis the same lady!" "Oh! That would alter matters, nat'ch'rally." Dinah swept the cards to gether again and shuffled them. "Shall I tell your fortune, mistress?" she asked mischievously. "No," said Mrs Bosenna, rising. "The rain has stopped, and it's time we were getting home, between the showers." Again Captain Cai and Captain 'Bias offered gallantly to accompany her to the gate of Rilla Farm; but she would have none of their escort. "No one is going to insult me on the road," she assured them. "And besides, if they did, Dinah would do the screaming. That's why I brought her." She had enjoyed her evening amazingly. She took her departure with a few happily chosen words which left no doubt of it. After divesting himself of his coat that night, Captain Cai laid a hand on his upper arm and felt it timidly. Unless he mistook, the flesh beneath the shirt-sleeve yet kept some faint vibration of Mrs Bosenna's hand, resting upon it, thrilling it. "The point is," said Cai to himself, "it can't be 'Bias, anyway. I felt pretty sure at the time that Philp was lyin'. But what a brazen fellow it is!" Strangely enough, in his bedroom on the other side of the party wall Captain 'Bias stood at that moment deep in meditation. He, too, was rubbing his arm, just below the biceps. Yet the explanation is simple. You have only to bethink you that Mrs Bosenna, like any other woman, had two hands. (To be continued.) TALES OF THE MERMAID TAVERN. BY ALFRED NOYES. VI. THE BURIAL OF A QUEEN. PART I. 'TWAS on an All Souls' Eve that our good Inn -His hair now flecked with grey, though youth still fired A little sad, as often I found him now Of iron that grated on the flags. A spade "O, room! He shuffled off the snow that clogged his boots, -On my clean rushes!-brushed it from his cloak Of Northern Russet, wiped his rheumatic knees, Blew out his lanthorn, hung it on a nail, Leaned his rude pick and spade against the wall, Flung back his rough frieze hood, flapped his gaunt arms, And called for ale. "Come to the fire," said Lodge. "Room for the wisest counsellor of kings, The kindly sage that puts us all to bed, And tucks us up beneath the grass-green quilt." "Plenty of work, eh Timothy?" said Ben. "Work? Where's my liquor? O, ay, there's work to spare," And turned to master Drummond of Hawthornden. The old were better. Proof-I am growing old. A new song, breaking on an ancient shore :— "Marlowe is dead, and Greene is in his grave, Where is the singer of the Faerie Queen? I drink to that great Inn beyond the grave! -If there be none, the gods have done us wrong.- In some great Mermaid Inn beyond the grave; He raised his cup and drank in silence. Lodge I saw John Ford, "With folded arms and melancholy hat" Then croaked again-"O, ay, there's work to spare, 'Why, that's a marvellous ring!" he said, And pointed to the sexton's gnarled old hand Spread on that black oak-table like the claw Of some great bird of prey. "A ruby worth The ransom of a queen!" The fire leapt up! The sexton stared at him; Then stretched his hand out, with its blue-black nails, Full in the light, a grim earth-coloured hand, But bare as it was born. "There was a ring! I could have sworn it! Red as blood!" cried Ford. Was master Ford that, when he suddenly spake, For a long journey, a lonely pilgrimage To some dark tomb; a strange and sorrowful soul, A monument of bitterness. He rebelled; |