“That’ll suit first-rate. Give me time to get mother prepared. I’ll be at the station sure. Good-bye. I’m so pleased to have met you. I’ll look for you Thursday if it don’t rain.” She picked up the net bag she carried and hurried off, Miss Helen looking after with an amused smile.
“Mary,” she said to her sister-in-law when she returned to the hotel, “did we ever suppose we should pick up a relative here away down east?”
“Why, Helen, who is it? I’m sure I know of no one.”
“Who is it, Aunt Helen?” asked Nan looking up from some post cards she had bought that day.
“Well, my dear, her name is Phebe Hooper.”
“Never heard of her.”
“Neither did I,” declared Mrs. Corner.
“Wait a minute. Surely you have heard of Maria Daingerfield.”
“Now I begin to see light. She is the one of whom the elder members of the family speak with bated breath because she married a Yankee officer. Her father practically disowned her, didn’t he? Cut her off with a shilling, so to speak?”
“Yes, poor man, if he had so much as a shilling when the war was over. He was very bitter, I believe, and I have heard mother say that Cousin Maria had practically no intercourse with her family after she went North to live. Well, my dear, I have this morning met her daughter Phebe Hooper, a rough and ready sort of person, but I imagine she is as good as gold. At any rate she is good to her mother and wanted the whole party of us to come make them a visit. Of course I knew it was out of the question to think of quartering six absolute strangers upon them, but I liked her for asking; it showed that there was a lot of her mother in her, though she talks like a Yankee, not of the best class, either, and doesn’t look like any of our family that I ever saw. Well, we compromised by my promising to take you all to spend the day with them on Thursday. They live in the country near Sebago and I think that it will not only be a pleasure to us but one to Cousin Maria, as well. She is quite an invalid from rheumatism. It will be a great thing for her to hear of her old home and those relatives we know something about.”