Timid, gentle creature that she is, she has always deferred to my superior intellect, but now--" "Yes," retorted Nora scornfully, "now, he has been routed with slaughter, and so he has to call upon other people to rescue him from the fruits of his own folly." "I am not asking aid," averred Hippy with dignity.

"I plead for simple justice." "Simple, indeed," interrupted David with a twinkle in his eye.
"I see very plainly," announced Hippy, "that I shall have to drop this O'Malley affair and defend myself against later unkind attacks.

But first I shall eat my dessert, then I shall have greater strength to renew the fray." "Then my services as a settler of arguments are not required," laughed Grace.
"Postponed, merely postponed," assured Hippy, and devoted himself assiduously to his dessert, refusing to be beguiled into further conversation.
Dinner over, the entire party repaired once more to the drawing room, where the young people performed for the judge's especial benefit the stunts for which they were already famous.
Much to Grace's annoyance, Henry Hammond attached himself to her, and try as she might she could not entirely rid herself of his attentions without absolute rudeness.

Tom Gray looked a trifle surprised at this, and Marian Barber seemed openly displeased.

Grace felt thoroughly out of patience, when toward the close of the evening, he approached her as she stood looking at a Japanese curio, and said: "I wish to thank you, Miss Harlowe, for inviting me to become a member of this house party.