“All right, girlie; I’ll do this one about the cars and chains. Do you mind if I go off by myself to think it out?”
Kenneth went into another room, and Patty looked after him in wonderment. She didn’t guess that he was longing to help her, and, though he couldn’t guess conundrums, he hoped he might puzzle out this question of mechanical power.
And then Mr. Hepworth came, and also Philip Van Reypen. They knew it was the last day, and they wanted to hear what Patty’s final report might be.
Philip Van Reypen had been greatly amused at the letter Patty wrote him, and, being an exceedingly sensible young man, he had not answered or referred to it definitely, but had accepted its dictum, and had called at the Fairfield house far less often. Nor had he again hinted for an invitation to dinner, but awaited one which should be freely given.
“How many yet to do?” he asked, blithely.
“Four,” answered Patty, disconsolately.
“Out with ’em! What are they? Not charades, I hope; I simply can’t do charades.”
“There’s one charade left, but here’s an enigma, which is about as bad. Oh, Mr. Hepworth, can’t you guess it?”
Appealed to thus, Hepworth made up his mind to help, if he possibly could, and both he and Van Reypen listened attentively as Patty read:
“‘I am intangible, yet I may be felt, seen, and heard. I exist from two to six feet above the ground. I have neither shape nor substance, and, though a natural production, I am neither animal, vegetable, or mineral. I am neither male nor female, but something between both. I am told of in the Scriptures, in history, in song, and in story. I am sad or merry; loving or treacherous. I am given or bought, and, because of my great value, I am sometimes stolen. I am used by men who swear, and by innocent children. Of late, there has been a prejudice against me, but I shall probably be in vogue as long as the world shall stand.’”