was not of long
duration; for in five minutes thereafter she stood at the door of her
husband's chocolate-colored villa, receiving his friend....

J. Edward Johnson was a tall, thin gentleman of forty-five.... A year
before, some letters, signed "Foster, Kirkup & Co., per Enos Billings,"
had accidently revealed to him the whereabouts of the old friend of his
youth, with whom we now find him domiciled....

"Enos," said he, as he stretched out his hand for the third cup of tea
(which he had taken only for the purpose of prolonging the pleasant
table-chat), "I wonder which of us is most changed."

"You, of course," said Mr. Billings, "with your brown face and big
moustache. Your own brother wouldn't have known you, if he had seen you
last, as I did, with smooth cheeks and hair of unmerciful length. Why,
not even your voice is the same!"

"That is easily accounted for," replied Mr. Johnson. "But in your case,
Enos, I am puzzled to find where the difference lies. Your features seem
to be but little changed, now that I can examine them at leisure; yet it
is not the same face. But really, I never looked at you for so long a
time, in those days. I beg pardon; you used to be so--so remarkably
shy."

Mr. Billings blushed slightly, and seemed at a loss what to answer. His
wife, however, burst into a merry laugh, exclaiming:

"Oh, that was before the days of the A.C.!"

He, catching the infection, laughed also; in fact, Mr. Johnson laughed,
but without knowing why.

"The 'A.C.'!" said Mr. Billings. "Bless me, Eunice! how long it is since
we have talked of that summer! I had almost forgotten that there ever
was an A.C.... Well, the A.C. culminated in '45. You remember something
of the society of Norridgeport, the last winter you were there? Abel
Mallory, for instance?"

"Let me think a moment," said Mr. Johnson, reflectively. "Really, it
seems like looking back a hundred years. Mallory,--wasn't that the
sentimental young man, with wispy hair, a tallowy skin, and big, sweaty
hands, who used to be spouting Carlyle on the 'reading evenings' at
Shelldrake's? Yes, to be sure; and there was Hollins, with his clerical
face and infidel talk,--and Pauline Ringtop, who used to say, 'The
Beautiful is the Good.' I can still hear her shrill voice singing,
'Would that _I_ were beautiful, would that _I_ were fair!'"

There was a hearty chorus of laughter at poor Miss Ringtop's expense. It
harmed no one, however; for the tar-weed was al