afternoon, to some sort of a committee meeting which would have been
quite uninteresting to an outsider. But Mary Alice had some sewing to
do--something like taking the ugly, ruffly sleeves of cheap white lace
out of her blue taffeta dress and substituting plain dark ones of net
dyed to match the silk; and she was glad to stay at home.

"If an elderly gentleman comes in to call on me, late in the afternoon
but before I get back home," said Godmother, in departing, "ask him in
and be nice to him. He's a lonely body, and he'll probably be tired.
He works very hard."

Mary Alice promised, and went happily to work on the new sleeves which
were to give her arms and shoulders something of an exquisite outline,
in keeping with the fairy way of doing her hair, which Godmother had
taught her to admire in a beautiful marble in the Metropolitan Museum.

About five o'clock, when Godmother's neat little maid had just lighted
the lamps in the pretty drawing-room and replenished the open fire
which was one of the great compensations for the many drawbacks of
living in an old-fashioned house, the gentleman Godmother had expected
called.

Mary Alice went in to see him, and explained who she was. He said he
had heard about her and was glad to make her acquaintance.

He seemed quite tired, and Mary Alice asked him if he had been working
hard that day.

"Yes," he said, "very hard."

"Wouldn't you like a cup of tea?" she asked. And he said he would.

When the tea came, he seemed to enjoy it so much that Mary Alice really
believed he was hungry. Indeed, he admitted that he was. "I haven't
had any luncheon," he said.

Mary Alice's heart was touched; she forgot that the man was strange,
and remembered only that he was tired and hungry.

The little maid brought thin slices of bread and butter with the tea.
Mary Alice felt they must seem absurd to a hungry man. "I know what's
lots nicer with tea," she said.

"What?" he asked, interestedly.

"Toast and marmalade," she answered. "I'm going to get some." And she
went to the kitchen, cut a plateful of toasting slices and brought them
back with a long toasting fork and a jar of orange marmalade.

"At home," she said, "we often make the toast for supper at the
sitting-room fire, and it's _much_ nicer than 'gas range toast.'"

"I know it is," he said; "let's do it."

So they squatted on the rug in front of the open fire. Both wanted to
toast, and they took turns.

"I don