“Mr. Haley has just stopped by to say that he thinks no price is too great to pay for peace, and fellowship, and good-will in a community,” she said, as she dropped into a rocker and looked pensively after the retreating figure of the handsome young Dominie, who had accompanied them to the gate but wisely no farther.  He didn’t know that Jane had gone with Polk.

“And women to pay the price,” answered Mamie, spiritedly.  “I have just told Ned that as yet I do not know enough to argue the question of woman’s wrongs with him, but I have learned a few of her rights.  One of mine is to have him accept any invitation I am responsible for having my friends offer him, and to accompany me to the entertainment if I desire to go.  I reminded him that I had not troubled him often as an escort since my marriage.  He was so scared that he almost let little Ned drop out of his arms, and he got in an awful hurry to go to town, but he asked me to have his gray flannels pressed before Tuesday and to buy him a blue tie to go with a new shirt he has.  I never like to spank Ned or the children, but I must say it does clear the atmosphere.”

“You don’t think we could put it off or—­or—­” Sallie faltered.

“No!” answered Mamie and I together, and as I spoke I called Jasper to set out more rockers and have Petunia get the tea-tray ready, for I saw Aunt Augusta go across the road to collect Cousin Martha and Mrs. Hargrove and the rest, while Nell whirled by in her rakish little car on her way to the Square and called that she would be back.

When Nell used a thousand dollars of her own money, left her by her grandmother, to buy that little Buick, Glendale promptly had a spell of epilepsy that lasted for days.  The whole town still dodges and swears when it sees her coming, for she drives with a combination of feminine recklessness and masculine speed that is to say the least alarming.  To see Aunt Augusta out for a spin with her is a delicious sight.

And it was most interesting to listen to a minute description of the composite fit thrown by the male population of Glendale, at their rally invitation, but as time was limited I finally coaxed the conversation around to the subject of the viands to be offered the lordly creatures in the way of propitiation for the insult that we were forcing them to swallow by taking matters in our own hands, and then we had a really glorious time.

I am glad I have had a year or more in Paris, months in Italy, weeks in Berlin, and a sojourn in England, just so that I can be sure myself and assure the others with authority that there are no such cooks in all the world as the women in the Harpeth Valley of Tennessee, United States of America.

The afternoon wore away on the wings of magic, and the long, purple shadows were falling across the street, a rustle of cool night wind was stirring the tree-tops and the first star was coming timidly out into the gloaming, before they all realized that it was time to hurry and scurry under roof-trees.