said, while Newland's spirit filled with
a bitterness extraordinary even in an interrupted poet;--"I'm afraid
it's Mr. Dill coming up the walk. We'll have to postpone----" She rose
and went to the steps to greet the approaching guest. "How nice of you
to come!"

Noble, remaining on the lowest step, clung to her hand in a fever. "Nice
to come!" he said hoarsely. "It's eight days--eight days--eight days
since----"

"Mr. Sanders is here," she said. "It's so dark on this big veranda
people can hardly see each other. Come up and sit with us. I don't have
to introduce you two men to each other."

She did not, indeed. They said "H'lo, Dill" and "H'lo Sanders" in a
manner of such slighting superiority that only the utmost familiarity
could have bred a contempt so magnificent. Then, when the three were
seated, Mr. Sanders thought well to add: "How's rent collecting these
days, Dill? Still hustling around among those darky shanties over in
Bucktown?"

In the dark Noble moved convulsively, but contrived to affect a light
laugh, or a sound meant for one, as he replied, in a voice not entirely
under control: "How's the ole poetry, Sanders?"

"What?" Newland demanded sharply. "What did you say?"

"I said: 'How's the ole poetry?' Do you read it to all your relations
the way you used to?"

"See here, Dill!"

"Well, what you want, Sanders?"

"You try to talk about things you understand," said Newland. "You better
keep your mind on collecting four dollars a week from some poor coloured
widow, and don't----"

"I'd _rather_ keep my mind on that!" Noble was inspired to retort. "Your
Aunt Georgina told my mother that ever since you began thinkin' you
could write poetry the life your family led was just----"

Newland interrupted. He knew the improper thing his Aunt Georgina had
said, and he was again, and doubly, infuriated by the prospect of its
repetition here. He began fiercely:

"Dill, you see here----"

"Your Aunt Georgina said----"

Both voices had risen. Plainly it was time for someone to say:
"Gentlemen! Gentlemen!" Julia glanced anxiously through the darkness of
the room beyond the open window beside her, to where the light of the
library lamp shone upon a door ajar; and she was the more nervous
because Noble, to give the effect of coolness, had lit an Orduma
cigarette.

She laughed amiably, as if the two young gentlemen were as amiable as
she. "I've thought of something," she said. "Let's take the settee and
so