Mrs. Pole began active preparations for the reception of her niece and the children.
The large bedroom on the ground floor which had once been the private apartment of old Mr. Cleve, and two smaller rooms in the rear of that were fitted up for the family.
“Because,” said Palma, “these rooms all open upon the back porch and the end porch, and will be so convenient for the little children to run in and out without danger of falling from any height or hurting themselves.”
Mrs. Pole was ready to cry with the feeling of the young woman’s tender, thoughtful kindness.
Palma was busy also with her own preparations. It was no very easy matter to pack trunks for her husband, her children and herself for a voyage to Europe. It would have been a much harder task but that Cleve continually reminded her that she really needed to take no more than they might require on their voyage.
“To carry clothes to Europe is to ‘carry coals to Newcastle,’” he said, quoting an old proverb.
Hatty, to her great delight, was selected from all the other servants to go with them as lady’s maid and children’s nurse.
The last week of their stay at Wolfscliff came. And the program for that week was all laid out.
On Sunday they all went to church together.
On Monday Mr. and Mrs. Cleve Stuart gave a dinner party at Wolfscliff in honor of their guest, The O’Melaghlin, and for which the invitations had been given out several days previous. This was a great success. All the family connections of the Stuarts and the Cleves were on hand, and The O’Melaghlin was in great force, notwithstanding, or perhaps just because, he had taken a great deal more wine than was good for him. But in this respect he was kept well in countenance by the elders of that dinner table; for up to this time the total abstinence movement had not reached that neighborhood, where the heads of old families kept up the convivial habits of their forefathers.