The telegram announcing Phyllis's safe arrival came before luncheon the next morning, and the following day brought her first letter.
"Dearest Auntie, Girls, and Truchi-ki," it began: "Behold me of an arrival—you see, I am inclined to French forms. I had the nicest kind of a journey—so nice that I should be delighted to repeat it to-night—with the steamer's bow headed the other way!"
"Dear old Phyl; telegraph her to do it!" cried Barbara.
"But I am here to stay, and not so homesick as you might think I would be. Mrs. Dean is a dear, and Boston reserve may be as icy as the comic newspapers say, but when it makes up its mind to thaw it really is as warming as port wine, with much of the same rich, dignified quality. Mrs. Dean treats me with what I should call respectful affection, and that is the kind of treatment that makes a snip of a girl, away from home for the first time, feel self-reliant; it puts her on her mettle to be as womanly, contented, and generally pretty-behaved as she is expected to be. Mrs. Dean evidently intends to watch over me, and make me happy if she can, and the least I can do under such goodness is to be happy. She is going to save my self-respect by letting me feel she did not take me for charity, but that she really wanted me for service. My duties are to read to her, attend to her correspondence, and bear her company from her breakfast, at half-past eight, till luncheon, at one. After luncheon she drives for an hour, when I accompany her, after which drive she lies down, and I am free till the seven o'clock dinner. In the evening I sit with her, reading or playing backgammon or cribbage, until nine, except those evenings when her nephews and nieces call, or, as she says with a significant twinkle, when she feels minded to go to a concert or play, as she will sometimes, now that she has a youthful companion to enjoy frivolity as much as she does.
"She is interested in my account of my little hopes, and says I must continue writing while with her, and she will see to it that I have time to do so for hours in the splendid great library. Oh, dear folkses, do you suppose our library at Fortieth Street will be as glorious as this beautiful Greek temple here? Of course, I maintain to Mrs. Dean that it is to be surpassed by the New York library when it is done, but in my heart of hearts I wonder if ours can equal the Boston one.
"I have not seen much more of the city than the library; not that from the inside. The coachman brought me through Copley Square this morning when I arrived, and this afternoon I went down among the shops with Mrs. Dean. The shops look rather serious after our beauties; indeed, though Boston is handsomer than New York—that is, Commonwealth Avenue and around it, where Mrs. Dean lives, is fine—it is not cheerful and bright like our own queer, big jumble of a city, but looks as though it wore gray, and wore it on principle. We went down in the subway, and I felt dreadfully mortified not to have a hand-bag. Every woman, young and old, except myself, carried a little cloth bag, most of them shaped like school satchels held together by their leather handles. I felt as though I were out without some necessary article of clothing, not a hat or anything that might ever be superfluous, but something as dreadful to want as the waist of my dress, for instance. I certainly must get a bag, if I want to be respectable—I wonder if Boston policemen arrest girls who go out without bags, if they are alone? Mrs. Dean had one, so that may have saved me. Dearest, darlingest family, I hope you miss me—not too much, but a little. And I hope Violet will keep the kitchen and all my dear tins in apple-pie order; tell her I said so. And don't let Trucie miss me, yet don't let him forget me. And I am glad I came away, yet I would give anything to drop down among you as I shall drop this letter into the box. Altogether, I am a bundle of contradictions, you see; but I am doing as well as one could expect me to, and am going to be busy and contented. Write me, one of you, every day; for I love you more than you know, and it is a wee bit hard to be a wandering, prodigal daughter. Especially to such a home body as your spoiled, but loving Phyllis."
"She is homesick, but she doesn't mean to let herself find it out," said Jessamy.
"Dear little Phyllis! It won't hurt her to test herself under new conditions, but I hope she will feel that she can come back to us soon," said Mrs. Wyndham. "Now, your note, Jessamy? From Mrs. Van Alyn, isn't it?"
"I think so," said Jessamy, examining the envelop, with that peculiar carefulness every one bestows on the outside of a letter, instead of opening it and looking at the signature. "Yes, it is, and she wants Bab and me to plunge into society; just listen!" she added, when she finally had opened the note and glanced at its contents.
"'My dear Jessamy: We are going to have an entertainment, in aid of the Baby's Hospital, that promises to be quite charming. It is to be a Masque of Shakspere. The Mr. Lane whom you met at my house has written or constructed for us a Masque on the lines of those used in the Elizabethan period, in which many of Shakspere's characters, culled from all the plays, are introduced. He has used the Shaksperian text as far as possible, connecting it with original matter to bring out the very simple plot—it is practically but a meeting between all the dear characters whom we know, but who have hitherto never known one another. I beg you to help in this merrymaking, you and Barbara, and implore your mother to allow you to do so. First of all, I need you; secondly, you have been too long recluses from your old acquaintances, from whom mere change of circumstances should not wholly debar you. Jessamy is to be Miranda, for good and sufficient reasons, and Babbie will be, if she will, Beatrice. She is not quite large enough to realize exactly one's conception of "dear Lady Disdain," but she is admirably adapted for her otherwise, having by nature much of that young woman's ready wit and her loving heart, imperfectly concealed by the saucy tongue. I have asked your Doctor Tom to be Benedick—an added reason for our Beatrice to be a success, if my observations the last few times that I have seen Bab with him and marked her snubbing of him are correct. It will be a delightful frolic, for we all love play-acting, and it will be a remarkably pretty affair if it goes well. So don't refuse me, dear Jessamy and Barbara, and tell your mother I say that it is as wrong to hide her daughters in a Harlem flat as to hide her light under a bushel. Say yes at once, and oblige your friend, Mary Van Alyn.'"