wisely refrained from being the first to speak of the matter.  That she was going to Washington Ethelyn had no doubt, and this made her intercourse with the Olneyites far more endurable.  Some of them she found pleasant, cultivated people—­especially Mr. Townsend, the clergyman, who, after the Sunday on which she appeared at the Village Hall in her blue silk and elegant basquine, came to see her, and seemed so much like an old friend when she found that he had met at Clifton, in New York, some of her acquaintances.  It was easy to be polite to him, and to the people from Camden, who hearing much of Judge Markham’s pretty bride, came to call upon her—­Judge Miller and his wife, with Marcia Fenton and Miss Ella Backus, both belles and blondes, and both some-bodies, according to Ethelyn’s definition of that word.  She liked these people, and Richard found no trouble in getting her to return their calls.  She would gladly have stayed in Camden altogether, and once laughingly pointed out to Richard a large, vacant lot, adjoining Mr. Fenton’s, where she would like to have her new house built.

There was a decided improvement in Ethelyn; nor did her old perversity of temper manifest itself very strongly until one morning, three weeks after her arrival in Olney, when Richard suggested to her the propriety of his mother’s giving them a party, or infair, as he called it.  The people expected it, he said; they would be disappointed without it, and, indeed, he felt it was something he owed them for all their kindness to him.  Then Ethelyn rebelled—­stoutly, stubbornly rebelled—­but Richard carried the point, and two days after the farmhouse was in a state of dire confusion, wholly unlike the quiet which reigned there usually.  Melinda Jones was there all the time, while Mrs. Jones was back and forth, and a few of the Olney ladies dropped in with suggestions and offers of assistance.  It was to be a grand affair—­so far, at least, as numbers were concerned—­for everybody was invited, from Mr. Townsend and the other clergy, down to Cecy Doane, who did dressmaking and tailoring from house to house.  The Markhams were very democratic in their feelings, and it showed itself in the guests bidden to the party.  They were invited from Camden as well—­Mr. and Mrs. Miller, with Marcia Fenton and Ella Backus; and after the two young ladies had come over to ascertain how large an affair it was to be, so as to know what to wear, Ethelyn began to take some little interest in it herself and to give the benefit of her own experience in such matters.  But having a party in Mrs. Dr. Van Buren’s handsome house, where the servants were all so well trained, and everything necessary was so easy of access, or even having a party at Aunt Barbara’s, was a very different thing from having one here under the supervision of Mrs. Markham, whose ideas were so many years back, and who objected to nearly everything which Ethelyn suggested.  But by dint of perseverance on Melinda’s part her scruples were finally overcome; so that when the night of the party arrived the house presented a very respectable appearance, with its lamps of kerosene, and the sperm candles flaming on the mantels in the parlor, and the tallow candles smoking in the kitchen.