ve company or boarders, or whose sons and
daughters don't come home for their holiday, and Miss Bettie Simcoe
says it's perfectly scandalous, the flirting that goes on. Miss Bettie
thinks anything matrimonial is close to scandalous, and she is
continually raising her eyebrows and making a half moon of her mouth at
what she says is the forwardness and freeness of present-day young
people. Miss Susanna always has a crowded house in August. A Doctor
Macafee and his wife and two daughters are here from Florida, and a
Miss LeRoy from New Hampshire, and Judge Lampton and his wife from
Alabama, and how she manages to put them away is known only to herself.

When I heard she was going to give up her room and take a tiny one in
the garret I made up my mind I would have an awful dream that night, a
regular nightmare, that would scare her to death and make her come in
my room to see what was the matter. I had it and she came, and I told
her I was subject to nightmares and ought not to sleep in a room by
myself, though I hadn't mentioned it before, and I wished she would
please sleep in mine with me and take the four-poster, which I thought
gave me bad dreams, as I wasn't accustomed to such high beds. And if
she would I would take the cot, as I liked cots much better. I am
subject to nightmares, or anything else that is advisable to have at
the proper time, and if I had known how many people were coming and
that Miss Susanna was going to give up her room, I would have had one
before, so she wouldn't think they had come on pretty sudden. But she
is not apt to think. She is a darling little old lady, not brought up
to think, and now too busy to do it, and she just works herself to
death with her head up and a smile on her face, and doesn't realize she
is spending all she makes in good things for the people who come here
and nearly kill themselves eating. She never buys herself any
clothes--that is, until Elizabeth has all she needs--and when I went up
to my room yesterday to think out a way of getting that lavender satin
for Miss Araminta, another thought came into my head, which was a black
satin for Miss Susanna.

Feelings are things one has to be awfully careful about in Twickenham
Town, and not for a billion dollars put in my pocket would I hurt
anybody's here, and I couldn't let Miss Araminta or Miss Susanna think
for a moment that their dresses were not all right, and how to get them
new ones I couldn't imagine. I st