"Oh, yes," says she. "Some lilac bushes."
And not being any too sure of just what I had seen I let it ride at that. Besides, there wasn't time for any lengthy debate. Next thing I knew we'd pulled up under the porte cochère and was pilin' out. We finds the big double doors wide open and the pink marble entrance hall all lit up brilliant. Grouped in the middle of it, in front of a fountain banked with ferns, are about a dozen people who seem to be chatterin' away earnest and excited.
"Why, how odd!" says Mrs. Robert, hesitatin' with her thumb on the bell button.
"Looks like a fam'ly caucus," says I. "Maybe they heard we were coming and are taking a vote to see whether they let us in or bar us out."
I could make out Andres Zosco in the center of the bunch wearin' a silk-faced dinner coat and chewin' nervous on a fat black cigar. Also I could guess that the tall chemical blonde at his right must be the celebrated Myrtle Mapes that used to smile on us from so many billboards. To the left was a huge billowy female decorated generous with pearl ropes and ear pendants. Then there was a funny little old guy in a cutaway and a purple tie, a couple of squatty, full-chested women dressed as fancy as a pair of plush sofas, a maid or so, and a pie-faced scared-lookin' gink that it was easy to guess must be the butler. Everybody had been so busy talkin' that they hadn't heard us swarm up the steps.
"I say," whispers Mr. Robert, "hadn't we better call it off?"
"And never know what is going on?" protests Vee. "Certainly not. I'm going to knock." Which she does.
"There!" says I. "You've touched off the panic."
For a minute it looked like she had, too, for most of 'em jumps startled, or clutches each other by the arm. Then they sort of surges towards the doorway, Zosco in the lead.
I expect he must have recognized some of us for he indulges in a cackly, throaty laugh and then waves us in cordial. "Excuse me," says he. "I—thought it might be somebody else. Mr. Ellins, isn't it? Pleased to meet you. Come right in, all of you."