"Has papa been talking nonsense to you all day, Carry?" asked Dove.
"No," said the matter-of-fact Carry, "it was the story of the 'King of the White Bears.'"
"I pghesumed on theigh ignoghance," said Mr. Anerley, mimicking his adopted daughter's pronunciation.
"We must give him up, Dove," said Will. "A man who will employ ridicule in a scientific argument is not worth answering. If he were not my father, I should express my feelings more strongly; as it is——"
Here Mrs. Anerley appeared, her pretty kindly face lit up by some unusual and pleasurable excitement. She was almost out of breath too.
"Hubert, do you know what's going to happen?"
"Never having been able, my dear, to calculate the probable line of your actions——"
"Be quiet. The Bishop is coming to open the church, when the alterations are complete. And, Mrs. Bexley says, that as their house is so far off, he will lunch with us."
"Dear me!" observed Mr. Anerley, "a bishop! I shall become quite respectable. What sort of wine will the exalted creature propose to drink—if a bishop drinks at all?"
"There will be several clergymen, you know, and——"