“Oh, nothing.  I didn’t come down to Boston to denounce the Pasmer family.”

“I suppose you didn’t like their being in a flat; you’d have liked to find them in a house on Commonwealth Avenue or Beacon Street.”

“I’ll own I’m a snob,” said Eunice, with maddening meekness.  “So’s father.”

“They are connected with the best families in the city, and they are in the best society.  They do what they please, and they live where they like.  They have been so long in Europe that they don’t care for those silly distinctions.  But what you say doesn’t harm them.  It’s simply disgraceful to you; that’s all,” said Dan furiously.

“I’m glad it’s no worse, Dan,” said his sister, with a tranquil smile.  “And if you’ll stop prancing up and down the room, and take a seat, and behave yourself in a Christian manner, I’ll talk with you; and if you don’t, I won’t.  Do you suppose I’m going to be bullied into liking them?”

“You can like them or not, as you please,” said Dan sullenly; but he sat down, and waited decently for his sister to speak.  “But you can’t abuse them—­at least in my presence.”

“I didn’t know men lost their heads as well as their hearts,” said Eunice.  “Perhaps it’s only an exchange, though, and it’s Miss Pasmer’s head.”  Dan started, but did not say anything, and Eunice smoothly continued:  “No, I don’t believe it is.  She looked like a sensible girl, and she talked sensibly.  I should think she had a very good head.  She has good manners, and she’s extremely pretty, and very graceful.  I’m surprised she should be in love with such a simpleton.”

“Oh, go on!  Abuse me as much as you like,” said Dan.  He was at once soothed by her praise of Alice.

“No, it isn’t necessary to go on; the case is a little too obvious.  But I think she will do very well.  I hope you’re not marrying the whole family, though.  I suppose that it’s always a question of which shall be scooped up.  They will want to scoop you up, and we shall want to scoop her up.  I dare say Ma’am Pasmer has her little plan; what is it?”

Dan started at this touch on the quick, but he controlled himself, and said, with dignity, “I have my own plans.”

“Well, you know what mother’s are,” returned Eunice easily.  “You seem so cheerful that I suppose yours are quite the same, and you’re just keeping them for a surprise.”  She laughed provokingly, and Dan burst forth again—­

“You seem to live to give people pain.  You take a fiendish delight in torturing others.  But if you think you can influence me in the slightest degree, you’re very much mistaken.”

“Well, well, there!  It sha’n’t be teased any more, so it sha’n’t!  It shall have its own way, it shall, and nobody shall say a word against its little girly’s mother.”  Eunice rose from her chair, and patted Dan on the head as she passed to the adjoining room.  He caught her hand, and flung it violently away; she shrieked with delight in his childish resentment, and left him sulking.  She was gone two or three minutes, and when she came back it was in quite a different mood, as often happens with women in a little lapse of time.