CHAPTER I
"Look to the bakemeats, good Angelica,
Spare not for cost."
Romeo and Juliet.
A November night in Glasgow.
Mr. Thomson got out of the electric tram which every evening brought him from business, walked briskly down the road until he came to a neat villa with Jeanieville cut in the pillar, almost trotted up the gravelled path, let himself in with his latchkey, shut the door behind him, and cried, "Are ye there, Mamma? Mamma, are ye there?"
After four-and-twenty years of matrimony John Thomson still cried for Jeanie his wife the moment he entered the house.
Mrs. Thomson came out of the dining-room and helped her husband to take off his coat.
"You're home, Papa," she said, "and in nice time, too. Now we'll all get our tea comfortable in the parlour before we change our clothes. (Jessie tell Annie Papa's in.) Your things are all laid out on the bed, John, and I've put your gold studs in a dress shirt—but whit's that you're carrying, John?"
John Thomson regarded his parcel rather shame-facedly. "It's a pine-apple for your party, Mamma. I was lookin' in a fruit-shop when I was waitin' for ma car and I just took a notion to get it. Not," he added, "but what I prefer tinned ones maself."
Mrs. Thomson patted her husband's arm approvingly. "Well, that was real mindful of you, Papa. It'll look well on the table. Jessie," to her daughter, who at that moment came into the lobby from the kitchen, "get down another fruit dish. Here's Papa brought home a pine-apple for your party."
"Tea's in, Mamma," said Jessie; then she took the parcel from her father, and holding his arm drew him into the dining-room, talking all the time. "Come on, Papa, and see the table. It looks fine, and the pine-apple'll give it a finish. We've got a trifle from Skinner's, and we're having meringues and an apricot souffle and——"