f you needed
her for a chaperon--if Mrs. Callender could not go--she would keep us
company."

"You have managed Aunt Harriet very well," said Phillida, with some
elation. "Better than I could have done."

"I must have done well. Mrs. Gouverneur gives me great credit for my
nice little scheme, as she calls it. But if she thinks I wish to be your
escort solely in order to get her to attend, I assure you that Mrs.
Gouverneur with all her penetration is mistaken."

Phillida colored a little at this polite speech as she said, "It will
please Mrs. Hilbrough to have my aunt there."

"Yes, Mrs. Hilbrough also will give me great credit where I do not
deserve it. I may call for you with Mrs. Gouverneur?"

"Thank you, it will give me a great deal of pleasure." Phillida said
this with a momentary fear of hearing Agatha overturn another chair
behind the sliding doors; but Mrs. Callender had taken herself and
Agatha to the basement, from motives of delicacy which Agatha was hardly
old enough to appreciate.

Mrs. Gouverneur never did anything by halves. She made herself agreeable
to Mrs. Hilbrough on the evening of the reception and complimented her
heartily on the distinguished people she had brought together. For there
was the learned president of the Geographical, with overhanging brows
and slow and gentle speech; there was the foreign corresponding
secretary of the Historical, a man better known as a diplomatist and an
author, whose long years abroad had liberalized his mind without
spoiling his open-hearted American manners. There were some of the
directors of the Metropolitan Museum, to which institution Pohlsen had
given some Central American pottery. The senior New York poet wandered
in his childlike way among the guests, making gentle and affectionate
speeches to friends, who wondered at the widely contrary moods to which
his susceptible nature is subject. Bolton, known in two hemispheres by
his prose and poetry, had come out of complaisance, protesting rather
indignantly to his friends that he didn't believe in Americans making
such an ado over a mere baron. In him the stranger saw a slight figure
full of character and not in any way to be trifled with; only men of
letters and his friends knew what pains he could be at to oblige and to
help the humblest of struggling fellow-craftsmen, provided he was not
forbidden to accompany the unstinted assistance with a little grumbling
at the fearful wreck of his time which all