Mary went back to Boston and to school, where old acquaintances were renewed and new ones made. The Misses Cabot welcomed her with fussy and dignified condescension. Barbara Howe hugged and kissed her and vowed she had not seen a girl all summer who was half so sweet.
"Why in the world someone doesn't run off with you and marry you this very minute I cannot see," declared the vivacious young lady.
"If I were a man I should."
Mary, who was used to Miss Howe's outbursts, merely smiled.
"Oh, no, you wouldn't," she replied. "I should hope you would be more sensible. No one will run off with me; at least I wouldn't run off with them."
"Why not? Don't you think an elopement is perfectly splendid--so romantic and all that? Suppose you were head over heels in love with someone and his people were dead set against his marrying you, wouldn't you elope then?"
"I think I shouldn't. I think I should try to find out why they were so opposed to me. Perhaps there might be some good reason. If there were no good reason, then--why, then--well, I don't know. But I should hesitate a long while before I came between a person and his family. It must be dreadful to do that."
Barbara laughed. "Nonsense!" she cried. "It's done every day in the best families, my dear. And then the reconciliation is all the sweeter. You just wait! Some of these days I expect to read:
'Elopement in South Harniss High Life. Beautiful Society Maiden Weds Famous Former Football--er--er--I want another F-- Oh, yes, Famous Former Football Favorite.' Isn't that beautiful? Dear me, how you blush! Or is it sunburn? At any rate, it's very becoming."
The Famous Former Football Favorite called at Mrs. Wyeth's on the evening following that of Mary's return to Boston. He was as big and brown as ever and declared that he had had a wonderful vacation.
"And you're looking awfully well, too," he exclaimed, inspecting her from head to foot. "She is, isn't she, Mrs. Wyeth?"
Mrs. Wyeth admitted that she thought so. Crawford nodded emphatically.
"By George, you are!" he repeated.
There was no doubt of his sincerity. In fact, the admiration in his voice and look was so obvious and unconcealed that Mary, although she could not help being pleased, was a little embarrassed. The embarrassment wore away, however, when he began to tell of his summer in the Sierras and to ask for additional particulars concerning her European trip. He stayed longer than usual that evening and came again a few evenings later--to show them some photographs he had taken in the mountains, so he said. And the following Sunday he dropped in to accompany them to church. And--but why particularize? Perhaps it will be sufficient to say that during that fall and winter the boy and girl friendship progressed as such friendships are likely to do. Miss Pease, the romantic, nodded and looked wise and even Mrs. Wyeth no longer resented her friend's looks and insinuations with the same indignant certainty of denial.
"I don't know, Letitia," she admitted. "I don't know. I'm beginning to think he cares for her and may be really serious about it. Whether or not she cares for him is quite another thing and I am sure I shan't presume to guess. If she does she keeps it to herself, as she does so many other things. She knows how to mind her own business and that is a gift possessed by few, Letitia Pease."
Mary went home for the Christmas vacation and spent the holidays, as she had spent those of the previous year, in helping her uncles at the store. The Christmas trade, although not so brisk as she had seen it, was not so bad as to alarm her, and the partners were optimistic as ever. Isaiah, who had been talked to like a Dutch uncle by Captain Shad and was consequently in deadly fear of the latter's wrath, declared that as far as he could see everything was all right. So Mary left South Harniss and returned to school and the duties of the winter term with few misgivings concerning matters at home. Crawford met her at the train and came to the Pinckney Street house that evening to hear the news from the Cape. It was surprising, the interest in Cape Cod matters manifested of late by that young man.
On a day in early April, Mary, hurrying to Mrs. Wyeth's after school, found a letter awaiting her. She glanced at the postmark, which was South Harniss, and the handwriting, which was Isaiah's, and then laid it aside to be read later on at her leisure. After many postponements and with considerable reluctance she had accepted an invitation to dine with Barbara Howe at the latter's home in Brookline and this evening was the time appointed. It would be her first plunge into society--the home life of society, that is. The Howes were an old family, wealthy and well-connected, and Mary could not help feeling somewhat nervous at the ordeal before her. She knew something of the number and variety of expensive gowns possessed by her young hostess and her own limited wardrobe seemed doubly limited and plain by comparison. But she summoned her unfailing common sense to her rescue and found consolation in the fact that Barbara and her people knew she was, comparatively speaking, a poor girl, and therefore could hardly have invited her with the expectation of seeing her arrayed in fine clothes. And if they had done so--here was a bit of the old Mary-'Gusta philosophy--their opinion was not worth consideration anyhow, and the sooner they and she reached mutual disgust and parting the better.
But although her best gown was not new nor expensive, and her jewels were conspicuous by their absence, the picture she made as she stood before the mirror giving the last touches to her hair was distinctly not an unpleasing one. Maggie, the maid, who entered the room to announce a caller, was extravagant in her praises.
"Ah, sure, Miss, you look fine," she declared. "You're that sweet one look at you would sugar a cup of tea. Ah, he'll be that proud of you and he ought to be, too. But he's a fine young man, and--"
