“How lovely your house is, Mrs. Morris!” said Mrs. Van Dorn, affably.  The Morris house was only a year old, and had not yet been nearly exhausted as a topic of polite conversation.

“Thank you,” said Mrs. Morris.  “Of course there are things about the furnishings, but one cannot do everything in a minute.”

“Now, my dear Mrs. Morris,” said Mrs. Lee, “I think everything is sweet.”  Mrs. Lee said sweet with an effect as if she stamped hard to emphasize it.  She made it long and extremely sibilant.  Mrs. Lee always said sweet after that fashion.

“Oh, of course you would rather have all your furniture new, than part new and part old,” said Mrs. Van Dorn; “but, as you say, you can’t do everything at once.”

Mrs. Van Dorn was inclined at times to be pugnaciously truthful, when she heard any one else lie.  Her hostess looked uneasily at an old red velvet sofa in a dark corner, which was not so dark that a worn place along the front edge did not seem to glare at her.  Nobody by any chance sat on that sofa and looked at the resplendent new one.  They always sat on the new and faced the old.  Mrs. Morris began absently calculating, while the conversation went on to other topics, if she could possibly manage a new sofa before summer.

Mrs. Lee asked if she knew if the new people in the Ranger place, “Willow Lake,” were very rich?  She said she had heard they were almost millionaires.

“Yes,” said Mrs. Morris.  “Very rich indeed.  Mr. Morris says he thinks they must be, from everything he hears.”

“Of course it does not matter in one way or another whether they are rich or not,” said Mrs. Lee.

“Well, I don’t know,” said Mrs. Van Dorn.  “Of course nobody is going to say that money is everything, and of course everybody knows that good character is worth more than anything else, and yet I do feel as if folks with money can do so much if they have the will.”

“I think that these new people are very generous with their money,” said Mrs. Morris.  “I heard they about supported the church in Hillfield, New York, where they used to live, and Captain Carroll has joined the Village Improvement Society, and he says he is very much averse to trading with any but the local tradesmen.”

“What is he captain of?” inquired Mrs. Lee, who had at times a fashion of putting a question in a most fatuously simple and childish manner.

“Oh, I don’t suppose he is really captain of anything now,” replied Mrs. Morris.  “I don’t know how he happened to be captain, but I suppose he must have been a captain in the regular army.”

“I suppose he hasn’t any business, he is so very rich?”

“Oh yes; he has something in the City.  I dare say he does not do very much at it, but I presume he is an active man and does not want to be idle.”

“Why didn’t he stay in the army, then?” asked Mrs. Lee, clasping her small white kid hands and puckering her face inquiringly.