By the way, she'll want to know who the ladies are." "It'll only be one this winter, I'm afraid," said Waterford, "as the Megsons have gone.

It's a Miss Crisp, Cruden, a friend of Booms's, who--" "Whom I met the other night at the Shucklefords' ?" said Horace.
Booms answered the question with such an agonised sigh that both his companions burst out laughing.
"Dear old Booms can tell you more about her than I can," said Waterford.
"All I know is she's a very nice girl indeed." "I agree with you," said Horace; "I'm sure she is.

You think so too, don't you, Booms ?" "You don't know what I think," said Booms; which was very true.
One difficulty still remained, and this appeared to trouble Horace considerably.
He did not like to refer to it as long as the melancholy masher was present, but as soon as he had gone in to fetch the papers, Horace inquired of his friend,-- "I say, Waterford, do you mean to say he chooses the very night he hasn't got a high collar to--" "Hush!" cried Waterford, mysteriously, "it's a sore question with him; but _he couldn't write if he had one_.

We never mention it, though." It is needless to say Mrs Cruden fell in most cordially with the new proposal.

She needed little persuasion to induce her to agree to a plan which meant the bright presence of her son and his friends in her house, and it gave her special satisfaction to find her services on such occasions not only invited, but indispensable; and it is doubtful whether any of the party looked forward more eagerly to the cheery Wednesday evenings than she did.
It was up-hill work, of course, for Horace, at first; in fact, during the first evening he could do nothing but sit and admire the pace at which Miss Crisp, followed more haltingly by Booms and Waterford, took down the words of _Ivanhoe_ as fast as Mrs Cruden read them.