The poor girl, pleasing herself with the idea of having produced the right impression on him at last, had only succeeded in becoming an object of medical inquiry, pursued in secret.

When he companionably took a chair by her side, and let Zo climb on his knee, he was privately regretting his cold reception of Mr.Null.Under certain conditions of nervous excitement, Carmina might furnish an interesting case.

"If I had been commonly civil to that fawning idiot," he thought, "I might have been called into consultation." They were all three seated--but there was no talk.

Zo set the example.
"You haven't tickled me yet," she said.

"Show Carmina how you do it." He gravely operated on the back of Zo's neck; and his patient acknowledged the process with a wriggle and a scream.