Smiling as changelessly as an ivory figurine she sat quiescent, avoiding thought, glancing about the living-room and hall, noting their betrayal of unimaginative commercial prosperity.  Kennicott said, “Dandy interior, eh?  My idea of how a place ought to be furnished.  Modern.”  She looked polite, and observed the oiled floors, hard-wood staircase, unused fireplace with tiles which resembled brown linoleum, cut-glass vases standing upon doilies, and the barred, shut, forbidding unit bookcases that were half filled with swashbuckler novels and unread-looking sets of Dickens, Kipling, O. Henry, and Elbert Hubbard.

She perceived that even personalities were failing to hold the party.  The room filled with hesitancy as with a fog.  People cleared their throats, tried to choke down yawns.  The men shot their cuffs and the women stuck their combs more firmly into their back hair.

Then a rattle, a daring hope in every eye, the swinging of a door, the smell of strong coffee, Dave Dyer’s mewing voice in a triumphant, “The eats!” They began to chatter.  They had something to do.  They could escape from themselves.  They fell upon the food—­chicken sandwiches, maple cake, drug-store ice cream.  Even when the food was gone they remained cheerful.  They could go home, any time now, and go to bed!

They went, with a flutter of coats, chiffon scarfs, and good-bys.

Carol and Kennicott walked home.

“Did you like them?” he asked.

“They were terribly sweet to me.”

“Uh, Carrie——­You ought to be more careful about shocking folks.  Talking about gold stockings, and about showing your ankles to schoolteachers and all!” More mildly:  “You gave ’em a good time, but I’d watch out for that, ’f I were you.  Juanita Haydock is such a damn cat.  I wouldn’t give her a chance to criticize me.”

“My poor effort to lift up the party!  Was I wrong to try to amuse them?”

“No!  No!  Honey, I didn’t mean——­You were the only up-and-coming person in the bunch.  I just mean——­Don’t get onto legs and all that immoral stuff.  Pretty conservative crowd.”

She was silent, raw with the shameful thought that the attentive circle might have been criticizing her, laughing at her.

“Don’t, please don’t worry!” he pleaded.

“Silence.”

“Gosh; I’m sorry I spoke about it.  I just meant——­But they were crazy about you.  Sam said to me, ’That little lady of yours is the slickest thing that ever came to this town,’ he said; and Ma Dawson—­I didn’t hardly know whether she’d like you or not, she’s such a dried-up old bird, but she said, ’Your bride is so quick and bright, I declare, she just wakes me up.’”

Carol liked praise, the flavor and fatness of it, but she was so energetically being sorry for herself that she could not taste this commendation.

“Please!  Come on!  Cheer up!” His lips said it, his anxious shoulder said it, his arm about her said it, as they halted on the obscure porch of their house.