CHAPTER XI.
THE TEA-PARTY It was quite a large tea-party, and was held in what had been the school-room; nothing there now, however, to recall an academic past, for even the space against which a map of the world (Mercator's projection) had once hung was gone the colour of the rest of the walls, and with it had faded away the last relic of the Hanky School.
"It will not fade so quickly from my memory," Tommy said, to please Mrs.McLean.His affection for his old schoolmistress was as sincere as hers for him.

I could tell you of scores of pretty things he had done to give her pleasure since his return, all carried out, too, with a delicacy which few men could rival, and never a woman; but they might make you like him, so we shall pass them by.
Ailie said, blushing, that she had taught him very little.

"Everything I know," he replied, and then, with a courteous bow to the gentleman opposite, "except what I learned from Mr.Cathro." "Thank you," Cathro said shortly.

Tommy had behaved splendidly to him, and called him his dear preceptor, and yet the Dominie still itched to be at him with the tawse as of old.

"And fine he knows I'm itching," he reflected, which made him itch the more.
It should have been a most successful party, for in the rehearsals between the hostess and her maid Christina every conceivable difficulty had been ironed out.