"Models!" scornfully. "I wish he were a romanticist. I declare, if this realism keeps on, I shall go and live in the country!"
"And have your husband's curios remain all night instead of simply dining." And Caroline pressed her hands against her sides.
"That is it; laugh, laugh! Carol, you have no more sympathy than a turtle."
"You are laughing yourself," said Caroline.
"It is because I'm looking at you. Why, I am positively raging!" She tore her husband's letter into shreds and cast them at her feet. "Jack is always upsetting my choicest plans."
"And my sobriety. If I had a husband like yours I should always be the happiest and merriest woman in the world. What a happy woman you must and ought to be!"
"I am, Carol, I am; but there are times when Jack is as terrible and uncertain as Mark Twain's New England weather. Supposing I had been giving a big dinner to-night? It would have been just the same."
"Only more amusing. Fancy Mrs. Nottingham-Stuart taking inventory of this Mr. Sullivan through that pince-nez of hers!"
A thought suddenly sobered Mrs. Cathewe.
"But whatever shall I do, Carol? I have invited the rector to dine with us."