make up in those wax autumn leaves; I
call that a likely spray of woodbine. It took me the bigger part of
three mornings to get it done, and 'twas in the winter I made it, so I
didn't have nothing to go by but my memory."

She pinched the stiff little garland into a more aggressive attitude,
and turned, with a sort of caress, to a jar of colored pampas grass
that flaunted itself in the corner. Annie's eyes followed the motion,
and Miss Pamela answered the question in them by handing her the jar
for a closer inspection.

There was pride in her voice as she spoke, though her tone was casual.
"It's just one of my _what-not_ vases, I call 'em. I invented it
myself. 'Twas a blacking bottle, to begin with, but I covered it with
putty, good and thick, and then I stuck all them things on it. Here's
a peach-stone basket and a couple of Florida beans and some seashells
that were brought me from down East. The sleeve buttons on the front
were broken, but I think they stand up well, and that gold paint does
set off the whole. It's been imitated, you'll find," she added,
dismally, "but the idea's original with me."

She replaced the jar in its corner. Then, as a sudden realization of
the duty of a hostess seized her, she seated herself decorously in a
stiff-backed chair opposite her visitor, and, adjusting primly what is
technically known as a "front breadth," gave herself unreservedly to
polite inquiry.

"Is your health good?" she asked, with an air of expecting the worst.

"Oh, very good, indeed," said Annie, conscious that she brought
disappointment on the wings of her voice.

"It has been a sickly season," remarked the elder lady.

"I am always well," laughed Annie, but it was the ghost of a laugh.

"And is Mr. Bangs well, and your aunt?" The voice rose at the last
word--expectantly. And Annie clutched at the fact that she had left
aunt Mary lying down at home.

"My uncle? Yes. But my aunt has a headache. Otherwise she'd have come
with me this afternoon."

"She'd better keep quiet." Miss Pamela shook her head. "A cousin of
mine, over Rutland way--Andromeda Spear, you've heard of her,
maybe--your aunt always puts me in mind of her--she used to have
headaches like that, and she wouldn't hear to reason about 'em. So she
kept on her feet when she'd ought to be lyin' down, and one day--'twas
a fall day, like this, I remember--she had a seizure in the hen house,
and she never got over it--though she lingered for years," sh