He didn’t care whether a fellow’s coat were old or new, if he liked the fellow, but he gave up the idea of taking Elithe to the club until he suggested it again on her return from Boston. Nothing could be more en regle than her attire, and Miss Hansford looked after her with pride, as she walked down the path with Paul and turned into the avenue. “Carries herself like a duchess. Nobody’d know but what she’d lived in a city all her life,” she thought, wondering how Clarice would receive her.
Clarice was not in a humor to receive any one very cordially. She had just had a letter from Jack which annoyed her exceedingly, and she was anxious to show it to Paul. He was usually early at the court, and, with Jack’s letter in her pocket, she waited for him to come, declining to play and seeming very much out of sorts. All the élite of the club were there, and two or three games were in progress when Paul at last turned the corner with Elithe.
“Where is Mr. Ralston?” a young lady said to Clarice; then, as she saw him in the distance, she added: “There he is now, and some one with him. Who can it be? Gen. Ray’s daughter, from New York, perhaps. They are expected here. She’s lovely, any way, and, look at her ripple skirt, seven yards wide, I am sure. It hangs well, too. How graceful she is, and what a pretty hat! There is something about a New York girl which marks her from a stiff Bostonian like me.”
If a face as fair as Clarice’s can turn dark hers did as she listened and looked at the slowly approaching couple. She had not seen Elithe since the meeting in the water, but she knew that Miss Hansford had gone to Boston, and that Elithe had gone with her. The little Daily News published in Oak City had it among the Personals, and she had wondered, when she read it, of what possible interest it could be to the world at large to know anything of Miss Hansford’s movements and who had notified the editor.
“Did it themselves, I dare say,” she said, as she threw the paper aside and thought no more of it.
Paul had given the Personal to the editor, thinking it would please Miss Hansford and Elithe to have their movements published with those of Gov. Tracy’s family, just arrived from Paris, and the President at Buzzard’s Bay, and Joe Jefferson, whose young kinswoman was soon to be married. Had he known where Miss Hansford was stopping in Boston he would have sent her a paper. As he didn’t know he kept a copy for her, but forgot to give it to her when he called for Elithe. He was telling the latter about it as they came up to the court, not that he sent the Personal, but that he saw it.
“I wish I had a paper to send to father. I never saw my name in print in my life,” Elithe said, pleased with the attention.
To be mentioned with the President and Joe Jefferson and Gov. Tracy was something to be proud of, and her face was beaming with pleasure at the honor and with delight at the scene the tennis court presented, with the gay dresses of the ladies and the fanciful costumes of the men.
“Isn’t she lovely?” the young lady who had first called Clarice’s attention to her, continued.
“Looks well enough, but I don’t call her lovely, and it isn’t Miss Ray, either. It’s that Hansford girl,” Clarice replied, with a toss of her head.