n
cut, with a little ruffle at neck and sleeves, that it did more than
adequate service toward maturing her. Indeed, there was no youth about
Miss Amabel, except the youth of her eyes and smile. There were
childlike wistfulness and hope, but experience chiefly, of life, of the
unaccounted for, the unaccountable. She had, above all, an expression of
well-wishing. Now she sat and looked about her.

"Dear me!" she said, "how pleasant it is to see this house open again."

"But it's been open," Lydia impulsively reminded her.

"Yes," said Miss Amabel. "But not this way." She turned to Jeff and
regarded him anxiously. "Don't you smoke?" she asked.

He laughed again. He was exceedingly pleased, Anne saw, merely at seeing
her. Miss Amabel was exactly as he remembered her.

"Yes," said he. "Want us to?"

She put up her long eyebrows and smiled as if in some amusement at
herself.

"I've learned lately," she said, "that gentlemen are so devoted to it
they feel lost without it."

"Light up, Choate," said Jeffrey. "My sisters won't mind. Will you?" He
interrogated Anne. "They get along with me."

No, Anne didn't mind, and she rose and brought matches and little trays.
Lydia often wondered how Anne knew the exact pattern of man's
convenience. But though Choate accepted a cigar, he did not light it.

"Not now," he said, when Jeffrey offered him a light; he laid the cigar
down, tapping it once or twice with his fine hand, and Anne thought he
refrained in courtesy toward her and Lydia.

"This is very pleasant," said the colonel suddenly. "It's good to see
you, Amabel. Now I feel myself at home."

But what, after the first settling was over, had they to say? The same
thought was in all their minds. What was Jeffrey going to do? He knew
that, and moved unhappily. Whatever he was going to do, he wouldn't talk
about it. But Miss Amabel was approaching him with the clearest
simplicity.

"Jeff, my dear," she said, "I can't wait to hear about your ideal
republic."

And then, all his satisfaction gone and his scowl come back, Jeff shook
his head as if a persistent fly had lighted on him, and again he
disclaimed achievement.

"Amabel," said he, "I'm awfully sick of that, you know."

"But, dear boy, you revolutionised--" she was about to add, "the
prison," but stumbled lamely--"the place."

"The papers told us that," said Choate. It was apparent he was helping
somebody out, but whether Jeff or Miss Amabel even he couldn't ha