id Mr. Opp. "And if you will sit nice and quiet and never say
a word all through supper, I'll get you a book with pictures in it,
representing flowers and things."

"Roses?" asked Miss Kippy, drawing a quick breath of delight; and when
Mr. Opp nodded, she closed her eyes and smiled as if heaven were within
sight. For Miss Kippy was like a harp across which some rough hand had
swept, snapping all the strings but two, the high one of ecstasy and the
low one of despair.

At six o'clock Mr. Opp went up to make his toilet. The rain, which had
been merely rehearsing all day, was now giving a regular performance,
and it played upon the windows, and went trilling through the gutters on
the roof, while the old cedar-tree scraped an accompaniment on the
corner of the porch below. But, nothing daunted, Mr. Opp donned his
bravest attire. Cyclones and tornadoes could not have deterred him from
making the most elaborate toilet at his command. To be sure, he turned
up the hem of his trousers and tied a piece of oilcloth securely about
each leg, and he also spread a handkerchief tenderly over his pink
necktie; but these could be easily removed after he heard the boat
whistle.

He dressed by the light of a sputtering candle before a small mirror the
veracity of which was more than questionable. It presented him to
himself as a person with a broad, flat face, the nose of which appeared
directly between his eyes, and the mouth on a line with the top of his
ears. But he made allowances for these idiosyncrasies on the part of the
mirror; in fact, he made such liberal allowances that he was quite
satisfied with the reflection.

"I'll procure the hack to bring the company back in," he said to Aunt
Tish rather nervously as he passed through the kitchen. "You assist Miss
Kippy to get arranged, and I'll carry up the coal and set the table
after I return back home. I can do it while the company is up in his
room."

All the way into town, as he splashed along the muddy road, he was
alternately dreading the arrival of one passenger, and anticipating
joyfully, the arrival of another. For as the time approached the
impending presence of the company began to take ominous form, and Mr.
Opp grew apprehensive.

At the landing he found everything dark and quiet. Evidently the packet
was unusually late, and the committee appointed to meet it and conduct
the guests to their various destinations was waiting somewhere uptown,
probably at Your Hotel. M