She was a
kindly girl, whose parents gave her free swing, and whose house, in
consequence, was popular with the younger people. Every Sunday she
offered to all who came a "Sunday-night lunch," which consisted of
cold meats, cold salad, bread, butter, cottage cheese, jam,
preserves, and the like, warmed by a cup of excellent tea. These
refreshments were served by the guests themselves. It did not much
matter how few or how many came.
On the Sunday evening in question Orde found about the usual crowd
gathered. Jane herself, tall, deliberate in movement and in speech,
kindly and thoughtful, talked in a corner with Ernest Colburn, who
was just out of college, and who worked in a bank. Mignonne Smith,
a plump, rather pretty little body with a tremendous aureole of hair
like spun golden fire, was trying to balance a croquet-ball on the
end of a ruler. The ball regularly fell off. Three young men,
standing in attentive attitudes, thereupon dove forward in an
attempt to catch it before it should hit the floor--which it
generally did with a loud thump. A collapsed chair of slender lines
stacked against the wall attested previous acrobatics. This much
Orde, standing in the doorway, looked upon quite as the usual thing.
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