'No she's not,' asserted Blanche, boldly. 'You're not tired, are you,
Miss Palliser?'
'Not too tired for just one game,' replied Ida. 'But you are never to call me Miss Palliser.'
'May I really call you Ida? That's too lovely.'
'May we all call you Ida?' asked Horatio. 'Don't begin by making distinctions. Blanche is no better than the rest of us.'
'Don't be jealous,' said Miss Palliser, laughing. 'I am going to be everybody's Ida.'
On this she was borne off to the garden as in a whirlwind.
There were some bamboo chairs and sofas on the grass in front of the bay window, and here the elder members of the family established themselves.
'I like that schoolfellow of Bessie's,' said Aunt Betsy, with her decided air, whereupon the Colonel and his wife assented, as they always did to any proposition of Miss Wendover's.
'She is remarkably handsome,' said the Colonel.
'She is good and thorough, and that's of much more consequence,' said his sister.