"Well, laugh," said Cora, half laughing herself, "but I am beginning to feel ambitious. Do let's try to set something afoot to make us feel as if we were alive, and glad that we were."
"Agreed, Cora," cried Miss Arthur, gushingly, "only tell us what it shall be."
"Suggest, suggest;" this from Davlin.
The spinster glanced up coquettishly, "Edward, you suggest."
Percy caressed his blonde whiskers thoughtfully, and letting his eyes rest carelessly on Cora, said, meaningly: "Let's poison each other!"
"Or commit suicide!" retorted Cora, coolly.
"Let's be more sensible," said Davlin. "Let's organize a matrimonial society, get up a wedding, and go on a journey."
"Anything that will break the monotony," said Cora, while the fair spinster giggled and put her hands before her face.
At that moment the monotony was broken.
While the words were still lingering on the lips of the fair convalescent, the door was opened wide by old Hagar, who said, as if she had been all her life announcing the arrival of great ones at the court of St. James: