Evelina's she poured only a few drops, but she filled
their guest's to the brim. "My sister and I seldom take wine," she
explained.

With another bow, which included both his hostesses, Mr. Ramy drank off
the cherry brandy and pronounced it excellent.

Evelina meanwhile, with an assumption of industry intended to put
their guest at ease, had taken up her instruments and was twisting a
rose-petal into shape.

"You make artificial flowers, I see, ma'am," said Mr. Ramy with
interest. "It's very pretty work. I had a lady-vriend in Shermany dat
used to make flowers." He put out a square finger-tip to touch the
petal.

Evelina blushed a little. "You left Germany long ago, I suppose?"

"Dear me yes, a goot while ago. I was only ninedeen when I come to the
States."

After this the conversation dragged on intermittently till Mr. Ramy,
peering about the room with the short-sighted glance of his race, said
with an air of interest: "You're pleasantly fixed here; it looks real
cosy." The note of wistfulness in his voice was obscurely moving to Ann
Eliza.

"Oh, we live very plainly," said Evelina, with an affectation of
grandeur deeply impressive to her sister. "We have very simple tastes."

"You look real comfortable, anyhow," said Mr. Ramy. His bulging eyes
seemed to muster the details of the scene with a gentle envy. "I wisht
I had as good a store; but I guess no blace seems home-like when you're
always alone in it."

For some minutes longer the conversation moved on at this desultory
pace, and then Mr. Ramy, who had been obviously nerving himself for
the difficult act of departure, took his leave with an abruptness
which would have startled anyone used to the subtler gradations
of intercourse. But to Ann Eliza and her sister there was nothing
surprising in his abrupt retreat. The long-drawn agonies of preparing to
leave, and the subsequent dumb plunge through the door, were so usual in
their circle that they would have been as much embarrassed as Mr. Ramy
if he had tried to put any fluency into his adieux.

After he had left both sisters remained silent for a while; then
Evelina, laying aside her unfinished flower, said: "I'll go and lock
up."

IV

Intolerably monotonous seemed now to the Bunner sisters the treadmill
routine of the shop, colourless and long their evenings about the lamp,
aimless their habitual interchange of words to the weary accompaniment
of the sewing and pinking machines.

It was p