As we reached the gate we saw the whole bunch sitting in the wide, cool hall—­Sister reading aloud, Sister Edwina making tatting, and Miss Lily Lou peeling a peach for Mother from a basket on the table beside her, and I was going to pass by and just bow to Mother as pleasantly and politely as I could (she was the only one who saw us), when to my surprise she got up and ordered me to stop by a wave of her hand.  I stopped.  She does not approve of me.  She thinks it very indelicate in me to accept the attentions of one whose engagement had so recently been broken, and, while she will never recover from stupefaction that Elizabeth should disagree with her son, she attributed that action on Elizabeth’s part to lack of sense and does not hesitate to say so, just as she has not hesitated to say things about me that were not as Christian as they might have been.  She knew, however, what was expected of Twickenham Town and that personal feelings were to be paid no attention to where politeness was concerned, and with a sort of scepter movement she beckoned to me and commanded us to come in.  We went.

It is a queer thing how nice disagreeable people can be when they want to, and that morning the entire Eppes family (even Sister Edwina, who’s the limit) were so polite and pleasant that Father never would have imagined how cocky and sniffy they usually are.  I behaved as well as they did, and when we came away I couldn’t remember a thing I had said that I shouldn’t.  We didn’t stay but half an hour.  I wouldn’t have held out a whole hour, and neither would they, and so, after we had seen all the beautiful old things downstairs and been introduced to all the painted ancestors, I got away quick, for Miss Anna was showing signs I didn’t think were safe.  They don’t know that they worship idols of wood and glass and silver and china, and images in old gilt frames, but they do, and the steel trust hasn’t money enough to buy them.  It’s a pity they won’t sell a few and put the money in some new clothes, for those they wear are a sight to behold.  As we were leaving, Mother Eppes invited us to take dinner with her on Sunday in a way that was more a command than an invitation and we accepted in a manner to match, though inside I was raging to think we’d have to go.  And then I remembered it would be a regular thriller to be eating at the table with Whythe and his family and my family, and I hoped I’d remember to call him Mr. Eppes, as down here they do that up to the day of the marriage, the first name being thought too familiar until after the ceremony, and even then in public.  Grace Marvin, who is engaged to Richard Clarke, calls him Dick, but that is because she isn’t ancestral; just accepted, Mrs. Grump says, and she knows, being familiar with the history of everybody in town.