t out for a corner where the cars stopped.
"Everything'll be lovely. Don't forget about Walter."

Nevertheless, Alice forgot about Walter for a few minutes. She closed
the door, went into the "living-room" absently, and stared vaguely at
one of the old brown-plush rocking-chairs there. Upon her forehead
were the little shadows of an apprehensive reverie, and her thoughts
overlapped one another in a fretful jumble. "What will he think? These
old chairs--they're hideous. I'll scrub those soot-streaks on
the columns: it won't do any good, though. That long crack in the
column--nothing can help it. What will he think of papa? I hope
mama won't talk too much. When he thinks of Mildred's house, or of
Henrietta's, or any of 'em, beside this--She said she'd buy plenty
of roses; that ought to help some. Nothing could be done about these
horrible chairs: can't take 'em up in the attic--a room's got to have
chairs! Might have rented some. No; if he ever comes again he'd see they
weren't here. 'If he ever comes again'--oh, it won't be THAT bad! But
it won't be what he expects. I'm responsible for what he expects: he
expects just what the airs I've put on have made him expect. What did I
want to pose so to him for--as if papa were a wealthy man and all that?
What WILL he think? The photograph of the Colosseum's a rather good
thing, though. It helps some--as if we'd bought it in Rome perhaps. I
hope he'll think so; he believes I've been abroad, of course. The
other night he said, 'You remember the feeling you get in the
Sainte-Chapelle'.--There's another lie of mine, not saying I didn't
remember because I'd never been there. What makes me do it? Papa MUST
wear his evening clothes. But Walter----"

With that she recalled her mother's admonition, and went upstairs to
Walter's door. She tapped upon it with her fingers.

"Time to get up, Walter. The rest of us had breakfast over half an hour
ago, and it's nearly eight o'clock. You'll be late. Hurry down and I'll
have some coffee and toast ready for you." There came no sound from
within the room, so she rapped louder.

"Wake up, Walter!"

She called and rapped again, without getting any response, and then,
finding that the door yielded to her, opened it and went in. Walter was
not there.

He had been there, however; had slept upon the bed, though not inside
the covers; and Alice supposed he must have come home so late that he
had been too sleepy to take off his clothes. Near the fo