Nobody realized it, but they were all talking and laughing as if they had known one another for years, and everybody was having a happy time. When they came back to the living room, they insisted that Carey should sing and Cornelia should play for them. Harry and Louise whispered together for a moment, then slipped silently back to the kitchen while the music was going on, and returned in a few minutes with a tall pitcher of lemonade and a plate of Cornelia’s delicious gingerbread. Carey went for plates, and acted the host beautifully. It all passed off delightfully, even with the presence of the carpenter, who proved to be a good mixer in spite of his lack of grammar.
Before they went away the minister had asked the brother and sister to join the choir and come to the Sunday school and young people’s society and all the various other functions of the church, and had given a special urgent invitation to the whole family, including the callers, to come to a church reception to be held the coming week. Carey acted as if church receptions and young people’s prayer meetings were the joy of his life, and acquiesced in everything that was suggested, declaring, when the door closed behind them, that that girl was “some peach.” And the household retired to their various pillows with happy dreams of a circumspect future in which Carey walked the happy way of a wise young man and had friends that one was not ashamed of. And then the very next afternoon, being Saturday, everything went to smash in one quick happening, and a cloud of gloom fell over the little household.
For it happened that Cornelia and Louise had taken an afternoon off, having arisen quite early and accomplished an incredible amount of Saturday baking and mending and ironing and the like, and had gone down to the stores to choose a much-needed pair of shoes for Louise. The shoes were purchased, also ten cents’ worth of chocolates; and they were about to finish the joyful occasion by a visit to a moving-picture show when suddenly, walking up Chestnut Street, they came face to face with Carey and a girl! Carey, who was supposed to be off that whole afternoon hunting for a job! And such a girl!
The most noticeable thing about the girl was the whiteness of her nose and the rosiness of a certain circumscribed portion of her cheeks. As she drew nearer, one also noticed her cap-like arrangement of hair that was obviously stained henna, and bobbed quite furiously under a dashing hat of jade-green feathers. Her feet were fat, with fat, overhanging flesh-colored silken ankles, quite transparent as to the silk, and were strapped in with many little buckles to a very sharp toe and a tall little stilt of a heel. Her skirt was like one leg of a pantaloon so tight it was and very short, so that the fat, silken ankles became most prominent; and her mincing gait reminded one of a Bach fugue. She wore an objectionable and conspicuous tunic much beaded with short sleeves and very low neck, for the street.
A scrubby little fur flung across the back of her neck completed her costume unless one counted the string of big white beads that hung around her neck to her waist, and the many rings which adorned her otherwise bare hands. She was chewing gum rhythmically and industriously, and giggling up into Carey’s face with a silly, sickening grin that made the heart of Cornelia turn sick with disgust.
As she drew nearer, a pair of delicately pencilled stationary eyebrows, higher than nature usually places them, emphasized the whole effect; and the startling red of the girl’s lips seemed to fascinate the gaze. They were coming nearer; they were almost near enough to touch each other; and Carey—Carey was looking down at the girl—he had drawn her arm within his own, and he had not seen his sisters.
Suddenly, without any warning Cornelia felt the angry tears starting to her eyes, and with a quick movement she drew Louise to a milliner’s window they were passing, and stood, trembling in every nerve, while Carey and the girl passed by.
CHAPTER XIII
Louise had given her sister one swift, comprehending look, and stood quietly enough looking into the window; but her real glance was sideways, watching Carey and the girl.
“That’s the one! That’s the chicken, Nellie!” she whispered. “Now, isn’t she a chicken? Don’t you think Harry is right? Turn around and watch her. They’ve gone ahead so far they’ll never see us now. Look! Just see her waddle! see her toddle! Aren’t those shoes the limit? And her fat legs inching along like that! I think she’s disgusting! How can my brother not be ashamed to be seen with her? And down here on Chestnut Street, too, where he might meet anybody! Think if that Grace Kendall should come along and see him! She’d never speak to him again. Oh, Nellie, isn’t she dreadful?”