"We have been serenaded to-night, Doctor—you just missed it. These are the Mount Mark troubadours. You are lucky to get here in time for the lemonade."
But when she saw the bishop glance concernedly from the yellow fingers to the dull eyes and the brown-streaked mouth, her gravity nearly forsook her. The Slaughterers, already dashed to the ground by embarrassment, were entirely routed by the presence of the bishop. With incoherent apologies, they rose to their unsteady feet and in a cloud of breezy odors, made their escape.
Mr. Starr laughed a little, Aunt Grace put her arm protectingly about Carol's rigid shoulders, and the bishop said, "Well, well, well," with gentle inquiry.
"We call them the Slaughter-house Quartette," Fairy began cheerfully. "They are the lower strata of Mount Mark, and they make the nights hideous with their choice selection of popular airs. The parsonage is divided about them. Some of us think we should treat them with proud and cold disdain. Some think we should regard them with a tender, gentle, er—smiling pity. And evidently they appreciated the smiles for they gave us a serenade in return for them. Aunt Grace did not know their history, so she invited them in, thinking they were just ordinary schoolboys. It is home mission work run aground."
The bishop nodded sympathetically. "One has to be so careful," he said. "So extremely careful with characters like those. No doubt they meant well by their serenade, but—girls especially have to be very careful. I think as a rule it is safer to let men show the tender pity and women the fine disdain. I don't imagine they would come serenading your father and me! You carried it off beautifully, girls. I am sure your father was proud of you. I was myself. I'm glad you are Methodists. Not many girls so young could handle a difficult matter as neatly as you did."
"Yes," said Mr. Starr, but his eyes twinkled toward Carol once more; "yes, indeed, I think we are well cleared of a disagreeable business."
But Carol looked at Fairy with such humble, passionate gratitude that tears came to Fairy's eyes and she turned quickly away.
"Carol is a sweet girl," she thought. "I wonder if things will work out for her just right—to make her as happy as she ought to be. She's so—lovely."