"Now, there you are off again, and all three of you this time!"
"It's Captain Bertram, ma'am," began Matty.
"Captain Bertram!" echoed Alice.
"Bertram," sighed Sophy.
"He says," continued Matty, "that we are all alike, and he doesn't know one from the other, and we are trying to puzzle him. It is such delicious fun."
"Delicious fun!" said Alice.
"Fun!" gasped Sophy, through her peals of mirth.
"Now," continued Alice, "he shall begin again. He shall go through his catechism. Here we three stand in a row. Which is Matty, which is Alice, which is Sophy?"
Captain Bertram pulled his mustache, swept his dark eyes over the little eager palpitating group, and in a languid tone pronounced the wrong one to be Matty.
The cackling rose to a shriek.