“Then I choose doughnuts,” was the ready answer.  “Doughnuts with holes in them and sugar sprinkled over the top, and light as a feather; the kind you used to keep in a yellow bowl with a white stripe around it, on the middle shelf in the Wigwam pantry.  Gee!  But they were good!  I’ve never come across any like them since except in my dreams.  And for the second choice—­let me see!” He pursed up his lips reflectively.  “I believe I’d like that to be a surprise, so Mistress-Mary-quite-contrary, you may choose that yourself.”

“All right,” she assented.  “But if it is to be a surprise I must have a clear coast till everything is ready.”

Arrayed in a long apron of Joyce’s, Mary stood a moment considering the resources of refrigerator and pantry.  There were oysters on the ice.  An oyster stew would make a fine beginning this cold day.  There was a chicken simmering in the fireless cooker.  Joyce had put it on while they were getting breakfast, intending to make some sort of boneless concoction of it for dinner.  But it would be tender enough by the time she was ready for it, to make into a chicken-pie.  In the days when Phil had been a daily guest at the Wigwam, chicken-pie was his favourite dish.  That should be the surprise for him.

It was queer how all his little preferences and prejudices came back to her as she set about getting lunch.  He preferred his lemon cut in triangles instead of slices, and he liked the cauliflower in mixed pickles, but not the tiny white onions, and he wanted his fried eggs hard and his boiled eggs soft.  But then, after all, it wasn’t so queer that she should remember these things, she thought, for the likes and dislikes of a frequent guest would naturally make an impression on an observant child who took part in all the household work.  It was just the same with other people.  She’d never forget if she lived to be a hundred how Holland put salt in everything, and Norman wouldn’t touch apple-sauce if it were hot, but would empty the dish if it were cold.

“I can’t paint like Joyce, and I can’t write like Betty,” she thought as she sifted flour vigorously, “but thank heaven, I can cook, and give pleasure that way, and I like to do it.”

An hour would have been far too short a time for inexperienced hands to do what hers accomplished, and even Joyce, who knew how quickly she could bring things to pass, was surprised when she saw the table to which they were summoned.  The oyster stew was the first success, and good enough to be the surprise they all agreed.  Then the chicken-pie was brought in, and Phil, cutting into the light, delicately browned crust, declared it a picture in the first place, and a piece of perfection in the second place, tasting the rich, creamy gravy, and thirdly “a joy for ever,” to remember that once in life he had partaken of a dish fit for the gods.

“Honestly, Mary, it’s the best thing I ever ate,” he protested, “and I’m your debtor for life for giving me such a pleasure.”