“Dorothy!” she said.  “Wake up, you wretched child!” And shook her again.

Mrs. Dicky groaned and yawned, and opened her eyes one at a time.

But when she saw it was Miss Patty she sat up at once, looking dazed and frightened.

“You needn’t pinch me, Pat!” she said, and at that Mr. Dick wakened and jumped up, with the carriage robe still around him.

“Oh, Dolly, Dolly!” said Miss Patty suddenly, dropping on her knees beside Mrs. Dicky, “what a bad little girl you are!  What a thing for you to do!  Think of father and Aunt Honoria!”

“I shan’t,” retorted Mrs. Dicky decidedly.  “I’m not going to spoil my honeymoon like that.  For heaven’s sake, Pat, don’t cry.  I’m not dead.  Dick, this is my sister, Patricia.”

Miss Pat looked at him, but she didn’t bow.  She gave him one look, from his head to his heels.

“Dolly, how could you!” she said, and got up.

It wasn’t very comfortable for Mr. Dick, but he took it much better than I expected.  He went over and gave his wife a hand to help her up, and still holding hers, he turned to Miss Patty.

“You are perfectly right,” he said, “I don’t see how she could myself.  The more you know of me the more you’ll wonder.  But she did; we’re up against that.”

He grinned at Miss Patty, and after a minute Miss Patty smiled back.  But it wasn’t much of a smile.  I was unpacking the breakfast, putting the coffee-pot on the fire and getting ready to cook the eggs and make toast.  But I was watching, too.  Suddenly Mrs. Dick made a dive for Miss Patty and threw her arms around her.

“You darling!” she cried.  “I’m so glad to see you again—­Pat, you’ll tell father, won’t you?  He’ll take it from you.  If I tell him he’ll have apoplexy or something.”

But Miss Patty set her pretty mouth—­both those girls have their father’s mouth—­and held her sister out at arm’s length and looked at her.

“Listen,” she said.  “Do you know what you have done to me?  Do you know that when father knows this he’s going to annul the marriage or have Mr. Carter arrested for kidnaping or abduction?—­whatever it is.”  Mrs. Dick puckered her face to cry, and Mr. Dick took a step forward, but Miss Patty waved him off.  “You know father as well as I do, Dolly.  You know what he is, and lately he’s been awful.  He’s not well—­it’s his liver again—­and he won’t listen to anything.  Why, the Austrian ambassador came up here, all this distance, to talk about the etiquette of the—­of my wedding, something about precedence, and he wouldn’t even see him.”

“He can’t annul it,” said Mr. Dick angrily.  “I’m of age.  And I can support my wife, too, or will be able—­soon.”

“Dolly’s not of age,” said Miss Patty wearily.  “I’ve sat up all night figuring it out.  He’s going to annul the marriage, or he’ll make a scandal anyhow, and that’s just as bad.  Dolly,”—­she turned to her sister imploringly—­“Dolly, I can’t have a scandal now.  You know how Oskar’s people have taken this, anyhow; they’ve given in, because he insisted, but they don’t want me, and if there’s a lot of notoriety now the emperor will send him to Africa or some place, and—­”