BY JENNIE BETTS HARTSWICK
Well, it's over, it's all over—bein' the last to leave I know that—and I declare, I'm that full of all the things we had to eat that John and me won't want any supper for a good hour yet, so I just ran in to tell you about it while it's on top of my mind.
It's an everlastin' shame you had to miss it! One thing, though, you'll get a trayful of the good things sent in to you, I shouldn't wonder. I know there's loads left, for I happened to slip out to the kitchen for a drink of water—I was that dry after all those salty nuts, and I didn't want to trouble 'em—and I saw just heaps of things standin' round.
Most likely you'll get a good, large plate of cake, not just a pinchin' little mite of a piece in a box. The boxes is real pretty, though, and they did look real palatial all stacked up on a table by the front door with a strange colored man, in white gloves like a pall-bearer, to hand 'em to you.
How did I get two of 'em? Why, it just happened that way. You see, when I was leavin' I missed my sun-shade and I laid my box down on the hatrack-stand while I went upstairs to look for it. I went through all the rooms, and just when I'd about given it up, why, there it was, right in my hand all the time! Wasn't it foolish? And when I came downstairs I found I'd clean forgot where I'd laid that box of cake. I hunted everywhere, and then I just had to tell the man how 'twas, so he handed me another one, and I was just walkin' out the front door when, would you believe it! if there wasn't the other one, just as innocent, on the hatrack-stand where I had laid it. So now I have three of 'em, countin' John's.
I just can't seem to realize that Eleanor Jamison is married at last, can you? She took her time if ever anybody did. They do say she was real taken with that young college professor with the full beard and spectacles that visited there last summer, and then to think that, after all, she went and married a man with a smooth face. He wears glasses, though; that's one point in common.
Eleanor's gone off a good deal lately, don't you think so? You hadn't noticed it? But then you never was any great hand at noticin', I've noticed you weren't. Why, the other day when I was there offerin' to help 'em get ready for the weddin' I noticed that she looked real worn, and there was two or three little fine lines in her eye-corners—not real wrinkles, of course—but we all know that lines is a forerunner. Her hair's beginnin' to turn, too; I noticed that comin' out of church last Sunday. I dare say her knowing this made her less particular than she'd once have been; and after all, marryin' any husband is a good deal like buyin' a new black silk dress pattern—an awful risk.
You may look at it on both sides and hold it up to the light, and pull it to see if it'll fray and try if it'll spot, but you can't be sure what it'll do till after you've worn it a spell.
There's one advantage to the dress pattern, though—you can make 'em take it back if you mistrust it won't wear—if you haven't cut into it, that is—but when you've got a husband, why, you've got him, to have and to hold, for better and worse and good and all.
Yes, I'm comin' to the weddin'—I declare, when I think how careless Eleanor is about little things I can't help mistrusting what kind of a housekeeper she'll turn out. Why, when John's and my invitation came it was only printed to the church—there wasn't any reception card among it.