I felt, Jane, you would have approved of that look! It was so human to human.
He came over with me, and that was one jolly party in the old dining-room. They all stayed until almost sunset, and almost everybody in town dropped in during the afternoon to welcome me home, and ask me where I was going to live. Jasper and Petunia hovering in the background, the tea-tray out on the porch set with the silver and damask all of them knew of old, and the appearance of having been installed with the full approval of Cousin Martha and James and the rest of the family, stopped the questions on their lips, and they spent the afternoon much enlivened but slightly puzzled.
Time doesn't do much to people in a place like the Harpeth Valley, that is out of the stream of modern progress; and most of my friends seem to have just been sitting still, rocking their lives along in the greatest ease and comfort.
Still, Mamie Hall has three more kiddies, which, added to the four she had when I left, makes a slightly high, if charming, set of stair-steps. Mamie also looks decidedly worn, though pathetically sweet. Ned was with her, and as fresh as any one of the buds. Maternity often wilts women, but paternity is apt to make men bloom with the importance of it. Ned showed off the bunch as if he had produced them all, while Mamie only smiled like an angel in the background.
A slight bit of temper rose in a flush to my cheeks, as I watched Caroline Lellyett sit on the steps and feed cake to one twin and two stair-steps with as much hunger in her eyes for them as there was in theirs for the cake. Lee Greenfield is the responsible party in this case, and she has been loving him hopelessly for fifteen years. Lots of other folks wanted to marry her, but Lee has pinned her in the psychic spot and is watching her flutter.
Polk departed in the trail of Nell Kirkland's fluffy muslin skirts, smoldering dangerously, I felt. Nell has grown up into a most lovely individual, and I felt uneasy about her under Folk's ministrations. Her eyes follow him rather persistently. On the whole, I am glad Jane committed me to this woman's cause. I'll have to begin to exercise the biceps of Nell's heart--as soon as I get some strength into my own.