There was not the least possibility of it being any one other than it was, but I guessed “Jack Wharton,” and had my ears boxed. Jack Wharton is a large creature with fat fingers, and more rings on each of them than a Plantagenet sword has coronets—a well-meaning, meritorious kind of man, and my sister Carrie’s special aversion.
Carrie sat on the arm of my chair, and paid little feminine attentions to my hair, which she tried to make the most of—there is not so much of it as there once was. A certain tendency to early harvest in hair is a family trait, and I occasionally subdue the arrogance of my sister’s youth by reading to her from the health column of some family paper.
She patted down the last wisp, and addressed me.
“Do you know, Rol,” she said, “I have an idea.”
“I leap for joy, my dear,” I replied.
Carrie is used to me. She went on unheeding.
“Suppose—suppose we give a children’s party.”
I looked at her in surprise. A children’s party in my flat! What did she mean?
“Suppose we give a masked ball or a grandmother’s tea?” I suggested.
“Oh well, if you will be silly—” Caroline said, sitting straight up, and adjusting the lace frivolity on her wrists.