hat way; but, as a
matter of fact, most of 'em was better off. At first the Purdy-Pells
started in to chop all their social dates for three months after each
sorrowful event; but when they saw they was being let in for a continuous
performance, they sort of detailed Cousin Cornelia to do their heavy
mournin' and had a black edge put on their stationery.

Maybe Cornelia didn't exactly yearn for the portfolio; but she didn't
have much choice about taking it. She was kind of a hanger-on, Cornelia
was, you see, and she was used to going where she was sent. So when word
would come that Aunt Mehitabel's rheumatism was worse and was threatenin'
her heart, that meant a hurry call for Cousin Cornelia. She'd pack a
couple of suit cases full of black skirts and white shirtwaists, and off
she'd go, not showin' up again at the Purdy-Pells' town house until Aunty
had been safely planted and the headstone ordered.

You couldn't say but what she did it thorough, too; for she'd come back
wearin' a long crape veil and lookin' pasty faced and wore out. Don't
know as I ever saw her when she wa'n't either just comin' from where
there'd been a funeral, or just startin' for where there was likely to be
one.

So she didn't cut much of a figure in all the gay doin's the Purdy-Pells
was always mixed up in. And yet she wasn't such a kiln dried prune as you
might expect, after all. Rather a well built party, Cornelia was, with a
face that would pass in a crowd, and a sort of longin' twist to her mouth
corners as if she wanted to crack a smile now and then, providin' the
chance would only come her way.

And it wa'n't hardly a square deal to list her with the U.B.'s as soon as
we did; for all this time she was doing the chief mourner act she was
engaged to young Durgin. First off it was understood that she was waitin'
for him to settle on whether he was goin' to be a minister or a doctor,
him fiddlin' round at college, now takin' one course and then another;
but at last he makes up his mind to chuck both propositions and take a
hack at the law.

Durgin got there, too, which was more or less of a surprise to all hands,
and actually broke in as partner in a good firm. Then it was a case of
Durgin waitin' for Cornelia; for about that time the relations got to
droppin' off in one-two-three order, and she seemed to think that so long
as she'd started in on the job of ridin' in the first carriage, she ought
to see it through.

Whether it was foolis