"Oh, Charlotte, you goose. You make me feel positively creepy," cried Betty.
"You don't see any one over my shoulder, I hope," said Dorothy with an involuntary backward glance.
"Now, Miss Burton," said Charlotte with a laugh, "I leave it to you if that isn't sufficient proof that I ought to be an actress."
"I'm afraid the modern manager would require still more proof than that, Charlotte," answered Miss Burton, much amused. "But you certainly did that well."
"Let's all tell what we think we could do if we had to," proposed
Betty. "What should you do, Ruth?"
"I suppose that after I've studied the violin a few years more I could give lessons," said Ruth thoughtfully. "But somehow I don't seem to look forward to it with any wild joy. Whenever I plan ahead, I always think of myself as in a home, making things look pretty, and having lots of dinner-parties. I believe I should like to be a model hostess," she added honestly.
"Oh, Ruth, just a society woman?" asked Charlotte with scorn in her voice.
"Ruth's idea means more than that, Charlotte, if you think of it in its broadest sense," interposed Miss Burton. "To be a perfect hostess implies capacity for managing one's household, a wide culture, forgetfulness of self and a ready appreciation of the needs of others, sincerity, charm, interest in one's fellow beings, and so many other good qualities that I can't stop to mention them. It's really a beautiful ideal, and Ruth is fortunate in living with a woman who is one of the few perfect hostesses I know."
"I don't think I quite realized before how much it meant," said Ruth. "But it must have been watching Aunt Mary that made me think of it, for I used to have quite different ideas. It just occurs to me," she added with an infections laugh, "that the last time I remember saying anything about it I told father that when I grew up I should keep a candy-shop."
"And eat all you wanted, of course," added Charlotte as they all laughed. "That was my first idea, too."