LaHume made several attempts to join in their conversation, and though Wallace lent him all possible aid Miss Lawrence effectually discouraged LaHume’s participation.  He reminded me of a boy making ineffectual attempts to “catch on behind” a swift-moving sleigh, and who is finally tumbled on his head for his pains.

Mrs. Bishop is famous the country round as a cook, and she excelled herself that afternoon.  Bishop is a crank on truck gardening, and the vegetables served would have taken prizes in any exhibit.  A delicious soup was followed by a baked sea trout—­I must not forget to ask Mrs. Bishop how she made that sauce.

I wonder why it is that the most skilled hotel chefs cannot fry spring chicken so as to faintly imitate the culinary wonders attained by a capable housewife?

“I want to ask you a question, Mrs. Bishop,” said Mr. Harding, after he had made a pretense of refusing a third helping of fried chicken.  “Did you really raise these chickens on this farm?”

Mrs. Bishop smiled and said they did.

“I don’t believe it,” he returned.  “If the truth were known they lit down here from heaven, and Jim Bishop nailed them and you cooked them.”

I was ashamed of Chilvers.  He ate seven ears of green corn and boasted of it, but I will admit I did not know it was possible to produce corn such as was served at that farmhouse dinner.  The crisp sliced cucumbers, the ice-cold tomatoes, the succulent hearts of lettuce, the steaming dishes of string beans, summer squash, and green peas—­it makes me hungry as I write of that simple but excellent feast.

I thought as we sat there of the democracy of that little gathering.  There was Harding, the multi-millionaire railway magnate, in his hickory shirt; the fastidious and monocled Carter with his wealth and boasted New England ancestry; Miss Lawrence, an heiress in whose veins flowed the purest blood of the southern aristocracy; Mr. and Mrs. Bishop, plain honest folk from ’way down east in Maine; and the unknown Wallace, driven no doubt by stress of poverty from the hills of his beloved country—­there we all were meeting one another as equals, enjoying the bounties Nature has so lavishly bestowed on her children.

I caught Miss Harding’s eye, and she smiled as if in sympathy with my wandering thoughts.  It takes a remarkably pretty young woman to lose none of her charm while eating green corn off the cob, but Miss Harding triumphantly stands that test.  She was talking to Marshall, who is so constitutionally slow that he is invariably half a course behind everyone else at a table.

Marshall was attempting to explain to Miss Harding how it is possible to hook a ball and play off the right foot.  He laid out a diagram on the table cloth, using “lady-fingers” to show the positions of the feet, a round radish to indicate the ball, and a fruit knife to illustrate the face and direction of the club.

Chilvers watched this most unconventional dinner performance with a grin on his face, and just as Marshall was showing just how the club should follow through, Chilvers called “Fore!” in a sharp tone.  Miss Harding and Marshall were so absorbed in the elucidation of this most difficult golf problem that they instinctively dodged, and when Miss Harding recovered, her cheeks were delightfully crimson.