[CHAPTER XV.]
GETTING READY TO BEGIN.
"Having company" is one of those incidents of life which in all circles, high or low, cause more or less searchings of heart.
Even the moderate "tea-fight" of good old times necessitated not only anxious thought in the hostess herself, but also a mustering and review of best "bibs and tuckers," through the neighborhood.
But to undertake a "serial sociable" in New York, in this day of serials, was something even graver, causing many thoughts and words in many houses.
Witness the following specimens:
"I confess, Nellie, I can't understand Eva's ways," said Aunt Maria, the morning of the first Thursday. "She don't come to me for advice; but I confess I don't understand her."
Aunt Maria was in a gloomy, severe state of mind, owing to the contumacy and base ingratitude of Alice in rejecting her interposition and care, and she came down this morning to signify her displeasure to Nellie at the way she had been treated.
"I don't know what you mean, sister," said Mrs. Van Arsdel, deprecatingly. "I'm sure I don't know of anything that Eva's been doing lately."
"Why, these evenings of hers; I don't understand them. Setting out to have receptions in that little out-of-the-way shell of hers! Why, who'll go? Nobody wants to ramble off up there, and not get to anything after all. It's going to be a sort of mixed-up affair—newspaper men, and people that nobody knows—all well enough in their way, perhaps; but I shan't be mixed up in it." Aunt Maria nodded her head gloomily, and the bows and feathers on her hat quivered protestingly.
"Oh, they are going to be just unpretending sociable little gatherings," said Mrs. Van Arsdel. "Just the family and a few friends; and I think they are going to be pleasant. I wish you would go, Maria. Eva will be disappointed."