“Swell!” mocked Lark.  “Do it up brown!  Oh, you’ll be a record-breaker of a college professor all right.  I’m sure this young Babler is just the type of man to interest the modern college professor!  Swell!  Do it up brown!”

“Ouch!” grinned Carol.

“Now, will you twins run down-town for the oysters?” asked Prudence briskly.

“Who?  Us?” demanded Lark, indignantly and ungrammatically.  “Do you think we can carry home oysters for the—­the—­personal consumption of this Babbling young prince?  Not so!  Let Fairy go after the oysters!  She can carry them home tenderly and appreciatively.  Carol and I can’t!  We don’t grasp the beauty of that man’s nature.”

“Oh, yes, twinnies, I think you’ll go, all right.  Hurry now, for you must be back in time to help me get supper.  Fairy’ll have to straighten the front room, and we won’t have time.  Run along, and be quick.”

For a few seconds the twins gazed at each other studiously.  Neither spoke.  Without a word, they went up-stairs to prepare for their errand.

They whispered softly going through the upper hall.

“We’d better make a list,” said Carol softly.

So with heads close together they wrote out several items on a piece of paper.

“It’ll cost quite a lot,” objected Carol.  “Thirty cents, anyhow.  And Prudence’ll make us pay for the oysters, sure.  Remember that.”

“We’d better let Connie in, too,” suggested Lark.

Connie was hastily summoned, and the twins whispered explanations in her willing ears.  “Good!” she said approvingly.  “It’ll serve ’em right.”

“But it’ll cost money,” said Carol.  “How much have you got?”

Then Connie understood why she had been consulted.  The twins always invited her to join their enterprises when money was required.

“A quarter,” she faltered.

“Well, we’ll go shares,” said Lark generously.  “We’ll pay a dime apiece.  It may not take that much.  But if Prudence makes us pay for the oysters, you’ll have to pay a third.  Will you do that?”

“Yes, indeed.”  Connie was relieved.  She did not always get off so easily!

“Twins!  You must hurry!” This was Prudence at the bottom of the stairs.  And the twins set off quite hurriedly.  Their first tall was at the meat market.

“A pint of oysters,” said Lark briefly.

When he brought them to her, she smelled them suspiciously.  Then Carol smelled.

“Are these rotten oysters?” she demanded hopefully.

“No,” he answered, laughing.  “Certainly not.”

“Have you got any rotten ones?”

“No, we don’t keep that kind.”  He was still laughing.

The twins sighed and hurried next door to the grocer’s.

“A nickel’s worth of pepper—­the strongest you have.”

This was quickly settled—­and the grave-faced twins betook themselves to the corner drug store.