CHAPTER FOUR
The next evening Dr. Franklin got home for dinner before his wife had returned from her tea. "Mrs. Franklin not home yet?" he asked of Doris, their maid; he still said Mrs. Franklin a little consciously and liked saying it. She told him, rather fluttered with the splendor of it—Doris being as new to her profession as he to matrimony—that Mrs. Blair had come for Mrs. Franklin in her "electric" and they had gone to a tea and had not yet returned.
He went out into the yard and busied himself about the place while waiting: trained a vine on a trellis, moved a garden-seat; then he walked about the house surveying it, after the fashion of the happy householder, as if for the first time. The house was new; he had built it for them. From the first moment of his thinking of it it had been designed for Amy. That made it much more than mere house. He was thinking that it showed up pretty well with the houses of most of their friends; Amy needn't be ashamed of it, anyhow, and it would look better in a couple of seasons, after things had grown up around it a little more. There would be plenty of seasons for them to grow in, he thought, whistling.
Then he got the gentle sound of Edith's pretty little brougham and went down to meet them. She and Amy looked charming in there—light dresses and big hats.
He made a gallant remark and then a teasing one. "Been tea-tattling all this time?"
"No," smiled Edith; "we took a ride."
"Such a beautiful ride," cried Amy. "Way up the river."
He had helped her out and Edith was leaning out talking to her. "I think I'd better come for you about one," she was saying. He thought with loving pride of how quickly Amy had swung into the life of the town.
During dinner he sat there adoring her: she was so fair, so beautifully formed, so poised. She was lovely in that filmy dress of cloudy blue. Amy's eyes were gray, but the darkness of her long lashes gave an impression of darkness. Her skin was smooth and fair and the chiseling of her features clean and strong. She held herself proudly; her fair hair was braided around a well-poised head. She always appeared composed; there never seemed any frittering or disorganizing of herself in trivial feeling or movement. One out of love with her might find her rather too self-possessed a young person.