Max and Lulu, sitting side by side at the table, exchanged glances,—Lulu's full of delight, Max's only interested. He shook his head in response to her's.
"What do you mean? wouldn't you like it?" she asked in an undertone.
"Yes, indeed! but I'm pretty sure papa couldn't afford such a place as that: it must be worth a good many thousands."
Lulu's look lost much of its brightness; still, she did not quite give up hope, as the conversation went on among their elders, Woodburn and the Elliotts continuing to be the theme.
"Will it be near enough to Ion?" Capt. Raymond asked, addressing Violet more particularly. "What is the distance?"
"Something over a mile, they call it," said Mr. Dinsmore.
"That is as near as we can expect to be, I suppose," said Violet.
"And with carriages and horses, bicycles, tricycles, and telephones, we may feel ourselves very near neighbors indeed," remarked Edward. "When the weather is too inclement for mamma or Vi to venture out, they can talk together by the hour through the telephone, if they wish."
"And it won't often be too inclement to go back and forth," said Zoe; "almost always good enough for a close carriage, if for nothing else."
"We are talking as if the place were already secured," remarked Violet, with a smiling glance at her husband.