den party is a prescription of mine. Naturally I am
expected to take my own medicine. I said to Mrs. B. Jones, 'What you
need, dear Mrs. Jones, is a little gentle excitement combined with
fresh air, complete absence of mental strain and plenty of cooling
nourishment.' Did you ever hear a garden party more delicately
suggested? Desire, will you sit in front?"

"Husbands first," said Benis. "In the case of a head-on collision, I
claim the post of honorable danger."

It was surely a natural and a harmless speech. But instantly the
various mistaken thoughts of his hearers turned it to their will.
Desire's eyes grew still more clouded under their lowered lids. "He
does not dare to sit beside Mary," whispered her particular mental
highwayman. "Oho, he is beginning to show human jealousy at last,"
thought Mary. "He has noticed that she likes to sit beside me," exulted
John. Of them all, only Aunt Caroline was anywhere near the truth. "He
has taken my warning to heart," thought she. "But then, I always knew I
could manage men if I had a chance."

A garden party in Bainbridge is not exciting, in itself. In themselves,
no garden parties are exciting. As mere garden parties they partake
somewhat of the slow and awful calm of undisturbed nature. One could
see the grass grow at a garden party, if so many people were not
trampling on it. So it is possible that there were those in Mrs. Burton
Jones' grounds that afternoon who, bringing no personal drama with
them, had rather a dull time. For others it was a fateful day. There
were psychic milestones on Mrs. Burton Jones' smooth lawn that
afternoon.

It was there, for instance, that the youngest Miss Keith (the pretty
one) decided to marry Jerry Clarkson, junior (and regretted it all her
life). It was there that Mrs. Keene first suspected the new principal
of the Collegiate Institute of Bolshevik tendencies. (He had said that,
in his opinion, kings were bound to go.) And it was there that Miss
Ellis spoke to Miss Sutherland for the first time in three years. (She
asked her if she would have lemon or chocolate cake--a clear matter of
social duty.) It was there also that Miss Mary Sophia Watkins, Dr.
Rogers' capable nurse, decided finally that a longer stay in Bainbridge
would be wasted time. It was the first time she had actually seen her
admired doctor and the object of his supposed regard together, and a
certain look which she surprised on Dr. John's face as his eyes
followed Des