“Better say ‘unreasonable prejudice.’ It’s nothing but that,” Herbert answered hotly. “Father has treated them like dogs, and people know it. Why, Mr. Grey is by far the finest-looking man in town, and Mrs. Grey is a lady, and Louie is a——”
Here he stopped, for Fred Lansing just then entered the room, and hearing the last words and seeing Herbert’s flushed face, said laughingly:
“Louie is a what? and who is Louie? Oh, I know; she is that pretty, bright-eyed girl I have seen two or three times riding her wheel like the wind. Is she to be one of the guests? I hope so.”
“Yes, she is,” Herbert answered emphatically, “and she has a wonderful voice. Maybe we can get a song from her. I am writing the names now—Mr. and Mrs. Grey. He is in the bank, you know, next to ours. You can help put the cards in the envelopes, if you want to do something.”
Herbert was in a hurry to get the Greys settled before any further demur from his mother. They should be invited anyway, and he wrote the addresses and passed the envelopes to his cousin, who put in the cards of invitation and dropped them into the basket with others ready to be delivered.
Mrs. White did not care for a controversy before Fred, and said nothing, thinking she would remove the envelopes before the basket went out. But she forgot it; and when, next morning, David went his rounds with the invitations, two were left at Mr. Grey’s.
“Oh, mamma! Look! Invitations for us all, and you have not called, either,” Louie cried, taking out one of the cards and reading that Mr. and Mrs. White would be at home Thursday evening, June —, from eight to twelve.
She was greatly excited, for she had thought a good deal of the party, of which so much was being said in town, but her mother’s decided “We shall decline” dampened her spirits at once. There was a storm of tears, under which Mrs. Grey might have given way but for her husband, who, when consulted, was more decided than his wife, and the regrets of the three were sent to the White house on the day preceding the party, bringing Herbert at once to the Greys with inquiries as to the reason why Louie, at least, could not come, even if her parents stayed away.
“I’ve told Fred so much about you,” he said, “and he wants to see you, and I was going to have mother get you to sing; Miss Percy is so fond of singing, and such a good judge; and now everything is going wrong. The head caterer cannot come, and will send some one in his place, and most likely the crew will be drunk and serve ice cream first, and leave the sandwiches in the pantry, as they did at Alice Rogers’; and now you are not to be there, and I wish we were not to have the blow-out, and I don’t care if it rains cats and dogs to-morrow. I hope it will.”
Having delivered this speech, which did not at all move either Mr. or Mrs. Grey, Herbert flung himself out of the house, with a feeling that he was a much-abused young man, and that without Louie the party would be a failure.