At her playful use of my name, a glance flashed from Miss Mitty to Miss Matoaca and back again across the high silver service.
"Then we are very grateful to Mr. Starr," replied Miss Mitty in a prim voice. "Sister Matoaca and I were just agreeing that you ought not to be allowed to ride alone outside the city."
"Perhaps we can arrange with Ben to go walking along the same road," responded Sally provokingly, "and I shouldn't be in need of a groom."
For the first time I raised my eyes. "I'll walk anywhere except along the road-to-what-might-have-been," I said, and my voice was quite steady.
Her glance dropped to her plate. Then she looked across the vase of chrysanthemums into Miss Mitty's face.
"Ben and I used to play together, Aunt Mitty," she said, offering the information as if it were the most pleasant fact in the world, "when I lived on Church Hill."
A flush rose to Miss Mitty's cheeks, and passed the next instant, as if by a wave of sympathy, into Miss Matoaca's.
"I hoped, Sally, that you had forgotten that part of your life," observed the elder lady stiffly.
"How can I forget it, Aunt Mitty? I was very happy over there."
"And are you not happy here, dear?" asked Miss Matoaca, hurt by the words, and bending over, she smelt a spray of lilies-of-the-valley that had lain beside her plate.