"Sarah will fetch them," answered Miss Deborah; and at that moment Sarah entered with the candy and a stately and elaborate dish, which she placed upon the sideboard.
"Poor, dear man," said Miss Ruth. "I suppose he never gets all the candy he wishes at home. I trust there is plenty for to-night, sister? But what is that Sarah just brought in?"
"Well," Miss Deborah replied, with anxious pride in her tone, "it is not Easter, I know, but it does look so well I thought I'd make it, anyhow. It is Sic itur ad astra."
This dish had been "composed" by Miss Deborah many years ago, and was considered by all her friends her greatest triumph. Dr. Howe had christened it, declaring that it was of a semi-religious nature, but in Miss Deborah's pronunciation the Latin was no longer recognizable.
It consisted of an arrangement of strips of candied orange and lemon peel, intended to represent a nest of straw. On it were placed jellied creams in different colors, which had been run into egg-shells to stiffen. The whole was intended to suggest a nest of new-laid eggs. The housekeeper will at once recognize the trouble and expense of such a dish, as the shells which served for moulds had first to be emptied of their contents through a small hole in one end, hopelessly mixing the whites and yolks, and leaving them useless for fine cookery.
No wonder, then, that Miss Deborah's face beamed with pride. But Miss Ruth's showed nothing but contempt. "That—that—barn-door dish!" she ejaculated.
"Barn-door?" faltered Miss Deborah.
"Barn-yard, I mean," said her sister sternly. "The idea of having such a thing! Easter is the only excuse for it. It is undignified,—it is absurd,—it is—it is preposterous!"
"It is good," Miss Deborah maintained stoutly.
"I don't deny that," said Miss Ruth, thinking they would have it for dinner the next day, and perhaps the next also,—for it takes more than one day for a family of two to eat up the remnants of a dinner party,—"but you must see it is out of place at a formal dinner. It must not appear."