this season."

It was nine o'clock when the hotel was reached, and it was noon of the
next day before a lot of crippled tourists managed to limp into the
dining room, leaving a trail of arnica and pain killers everywhere they
went.

"Oh, isn't this just lovely," said Miss Asquith, as Cal rolled her in an
invalid chair to her place at the table.

It was a couple of days before the effects of the Long's Peak trip
abated to a degree that recreation once more became a pleasure. During
the days of sight seeing and exploration of Estes Park, Chiquita had
opportunity to study the character of the saleslady depicted by Miss
Asquith, but she had little chance to talk with the lady on whom the
years sat as easily as upon one in her teens, and whose vivacious
temperament was contagious. The enforced respite gave plenty of time for
recounting interesting episodes in Miss Asquith's life, which she did
with charming grace.

To many, Miss Asquith seemed affected. The spontaneous spark of a
jovial, witty disposition burned just as brightly in her at forty-five
as it did a generation before, but the critic would not have it so. "It
is put on, it is not natural, it is out of place; she had better be
saying her beads preparatory to being buried," were some of the unkind
remarks heard.

Hazel said to Jack, "She shocks one at first with her display of
artlessness as a stock in trade, until you learn by experience that it
is natural."

"I presume, my dear, there are people at eighty who condemn the
'kittenish' actions of some at ninety, the same as those of thirty
criticise Miss Asquith. Is it envy?"

"I'll tell you, Chiquita," said the lady in question the day after the
peak episode, "I find great enjoyment in being jolly, full of fun,
possibly at times breaking all written rules of decorum and dignity; for
why should we poor mortals go around with a long face, rigid arms and
mouths full of pious ejaculations just because the Puritans brought that
style from across the water? I have been doped on fashion for a quarter
of a century, and fashions change, but in that time I have learned that
to laugh is to be with the world. To weep is to be alone. Better be a
little frivolous with good appetite than strain at dignity and wail with
dyspepsia. This etiquette and form is only skin deep any way."

"You are such a considerate little body I should have thought some
enterprising man would have captured you years ago," ventured Chiquita.