“That’s the sore point,” she said. “Carey hasn’t anything very good just now, though he has one or two hopeful possibilities in the near future. He is just working in a garage now, getting together all the money he can save to be ready for the right job when it comes along. Father is rather distressed to have him doing such work; he says he is wasting his time. But it is good pay, and I think it is better than doing nothing and just hanging around waiting. Besides, he is crazy about machinery, seems to have a natural instinct for finding out what’s the matter with a thing; and of course automobiles—he would rather fuss with one than eat.”
“It’s not a bad training for some big thing in the future, you know,” said Maxwell. “There are lots of jobs today where a practical knowledge of machinery and especially of cars is worth a lot of money. I wouldn’t be discouraged about it. He looks like an awfully clever fellow. He’ll land the right thing pretty soon. I like his personality. That’s another thing that will count in his favor. I want to get acquainted with him after dinner. Say, do you know you have let me in for an awfully interesting evening?”
“Why, that’s very nice,” said Cornelia, suddenly realizing that she had forgotten to worry about Louise’s getting the next course on the table safely; and here it was, hot and inviting, and she sitting back and talking like a guest. What a dear little capable sister it was, and how quietly Harry was keeping the machinery in the kitchen going!
Everybody seemed to be having a nice time; even Clytie Dodd was listening to something her father was telling, something about a young man where he worked who had risked his life to save a comrade in danger. Clytie was subdued, that was certain. Something, either the formality of the meal, or the impressiveness of the guests, had quieted her voice and suppressed her bold manner. She was not talking much herself, and she was not feeling quite so self-sufficient as when she came. It was most plain that she was quite out of her element in such an atmosphere, but she was a girl who was quick to observe and adjust herself to her environment. This might not be her native atmosphere, but she knew enough to keep still and keep her eyes open. Cornelia noticed that she was being left very much to herself so far as the two young men were concerned, and perhaps this had something to do with the subduing influence. Clytie was not a girl who cared for the background very long. She was one who forced herself into the limelight. Was it possible that just a little formality and a few strangers had changed her so completely? Perhaps she was not so bad, after all, as the children had led her to suppose. Just a poor little ignorant child who was trying her untaught hand at vamping. There might even be a way to help her, though Cornelia felt opposed to trying it when Carey was about. She could not yet consider Carey in the light of a companion of this girl without mortification. In all that little circle around the table her common little painted face shone up as being out of place, unrefined, uncultured, utterly untaught.
More and more as the courses came on the table Clytie grew silent and impressed; and, as the meal drew to its close, Cornelia gained confidence. The dainty salad had been eaten with avidity; the delectable ice in its pale-green dreamy beauty had come on in due time and brought an exclamation of wonder from the whole company, who demanded to know what it was, and tasted it as one might sample a dish of ambrosia, and praised and tasted again.
There was much laughter and fun over the blowing out of the candles by Carey and the cutting of the angel cake, which also brought a round of applause. Cornelia poured the amber coffee into the little pink cups that looked like sea-shells, and finally the meal was concluded and the company arose to go into the living room.
Then Clytie came into her own again. It seemed that rising from the formalities of the table had given her back her confidence once more. Seizing hold of Carey’s arm as he stood near her, she exclaimed:
“Come on, Kay, let’s go have a dance and shake some of this down. I’m full clear up to my eyes. Haven’t you got a victrola? Turn it on, do. I’m dying for a dance!”
CHAPTER XX
By this time they were in the living room and in full view of the whole company. Cornelia was standing in the doorway, with Maxwell just behind.