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 ing upon them and Mrs. Ellerton opened the subject, her niece interfered so resolutely, that I began to wonder whether pique had not something to do with it. Was she offended at having received no answer to her letter? Or—a sudden light burst in upon me—was she jealous of her gifted namesake. The latter suspicion I ventured to impart to John, who promptly demolished me.

"Why on earth should Miss Lamb be jealous of anybody under heaven?" he demanded. "I think you must have been reading dime novels, Dick."

"Then why won't she hear the name mentioned?"

"She is tired to death of it, as I am! Hang it all!"

As I said before, John was very unlike himself.

To make matters worse, a little thing happened about that time to stir him all up again about the authorship of the poems. Having borrowed some current magazines from Miss Lamb, we were sit-