Mr. Jelnik smiled, thanked him, and put the offer by.  And I knew he was right.

* * * * *

It had been a rainy day and was now one of those afternoons that have the rawness of autumn, though summer is still present.  It was so chilly that a fire burned in the library fireplace, before which I was sitting.  The wind was from the northeast, and the trees and bushes slanted before it.  Potty Black and I had the library all to our alone-selves, for Alicia was spending the day with Mary Meade, one of her bridesmaids.

The wedding was less than six weeks off, and preparations were under way.  It was to be a home wedding, the first to take place in Hynds House since Richard’s day, and somehow that lent the occasion the rose color of romance.  It was thus a part of Hynds House history, something Hyndsville couldn’t take lightly.  Alicia’s wedding was a town affair, in which everybody was delightfully interested.

Besides, the bridegroom himself was a Hynds on his mother’s side, as Hyndsville ladies remembered, when they sat on our front porch working on wonderful bits of embroidered things for the bride.  It was then I learned in fullest detail the whole history of Hyndsville, of the Hyndses, and of Great-Aunt Sophronisba in particular.  I fancy that the Witch of Endor’s neighbors must have had just such an opinion of her as these Hyndsville folk had of Great-Aunt Sophronisba.

South Carolina people always talk in terms of three generations.  When they say something about you, they remember something about your mother or your grandfather at the same time, and they tell that, too.  There is a fearsome frankness about the conversation of the born South Carolinian that The Author says is only to be matched in an English country house when the county families are gathered together.  Like this, for instance: 

“No, my dear, I can’t say I’m surprised at Sally’s running away and getting married.  Let’s see:  her grandfather was a Dampier, wasn’t he?  Didn’t one of the Dampiers murder somebody, or something like that?  It seems to me I have heard dear Mama relate some such circumstance.”

“Oh, no, Mary!  It wasn’t murder!  He shot one of the Abercrombies in a duel, that’s all.  He was really a very fine man!  They had a dispute about a horse, and Mr. Abercrombie struck Mr. Dampier’s little negro groom over the head with his crop.  After that, of course, there was nothing to do but challenge him.  You must be thinking of Barton Bailey, Eliza DuFour’s grandfather on her mother’s side. He was a complete scoundrel.  His poor wife (she was a Garrett; very dull, poor thing, like all the Garretts, but at least the Garretts were honest, which is more than even charity can say for the Baileys) his wife led a martyr’s life with him.  Or maybe you’re thinking of Tiger Bill Pendarvis.  A most awful person!—­almost an out-law!”

Mrs. Scarboro looked up, bit off a thread, and said placidly: