"What a ridiculous name!" Miss Kezia ejaculated.
The Atom was indignant.
"Is it rickelous? And how about Kezia, then?"
There was a pause.
Denis interposed amusedly: "Perhaps you don't know the song, Aunt Kezia?
It's like this--" Gaily his voice sang out:--
"'Oh, did you not hear of Kate Kearney?
She lives on the banks of Killarney--'
"Eh? Noise? _Noise_?" he murmured surprisedly. "Allow me just to
whisper the lines that fit K.K. so beautifully:--
"'For that eye is so modestly beaming
You ne'er think of mischief she's dreaming--'"
Grim and portentous came an interruption.
"Is it mischievous?"
"Er--" said Denis, and his eye twinkled, "she was when she was a puppy,
you see."
"Um," observed Miss Kezia. "If it works any mischief here, it will have
to be chained up in the garden."
"Sure, then," burst wildly from the Atom, "'tis myself'll be chained
beside her!"
"Sheila, do not be absurd!"
"And she isn't 'it'! If you call her 'it' again, I'll be callin' you a
Scotch bannock!"