inally obliged to go to see
John's mother without any encouragement other than Luther's urging.

The day came at last when the call had to be made, and for the first time
Elizabeth came in contact with polite society which smiles and bows in
polite form without any especial regard for sincerity. There was not a
ripple of discontent on the surface at her future home. Mrs. Hunter might
never have heard of the girl's family difficulties. The girl might have
called the day before, so courteous and charming was the dignified
hospitality with which she was accepted. Elizabeth felt as if the most
painful possibility of her life had been safely put behind her. She had
been nervous and uncomfortable about this visit, and was correspondingly
sensitive to the perfect manner of her hostess, and carried away with her
a new problem to work upon: if John Hunter's mother, by her poise and
presence, made of his home a social unit of appearance and value, John
Hunter's wife must not fall below the grade of that home when she became
its mistress. She pondered long upon that subtle air of good breeding
which ignored real issues and smoothed communication by seeming not to
know disagreeable facts. Elizabeth decided that it was much more desirable
than the rugged honesty with which the primitive folk about them would
have humiliated themselves by explanation and apology. She would copy that
suavity of manner. Also, she resolved not to discuss grievances. They were
a bore and it was horribly countrified.

"I will not let myself think any more about it. I will be myself, and not
be affected by what the rest of the folks do, and I'll not let myself sit
and fumble with my buttons because some one else is going to think about
them. Mrs. Hunter's manners are beautiful. I'd just love her if I didn't
know I was going to have to live with her," she thought. Mrs. Hunter was a
fixture in Elizabeth's mental world, and her estimates were the standards
Elizabeth considered when she sewed alone or when Aunt Susan was silent.
The girl was both fascinated and repelled by them. Mrs. Hunter's bearing
was the subject of constant and delighted meditation, while the cold
carefulness of it was a terrorizing nightmare. The girl kept up a
conversation with Aunt Susan on the sewing, or a fire of mirth and jollity
with Nathan or Luther, with this undercurrent of thought always going on.
How was she to emulate that polish with so little experience in social
affairs she