xpress three black pottery vases Etruscan preferred but
most expensive you have one eighteen inches high and two
twelve inches high am wiring fifty dollars to insure
transportation send balance C. O. D.

Not the least of J. Rufus' smile was that inserted clause, "Etruscan
preferred." He had not the slightest idea that there was such pottery
as Etruscan in the world, but his sage conclusion was that the big
firm would think they had overlooked something; and his other clause,
"most expensive you have," would insure proper results. That night he
wrote to Blackie Daw:

Whatever you do, don't buy vase either twelve or eighteen
inches high. Send one about nine.

Saturday morning the package came, and the excess bill was two hundred
and forty-five dollars, exclusive of express charges, all of which J.
Rufus cheerfully paid. He had that box delivered unopened to the
residence of Mrs. Henry Moozer. That afternoon he dressed himself with
consummate care, his gray frock suit and his gray bow tie, his gray
waistcoat and his gray spats, by some subtle personality he threw
about them, conveying delicately the idea of an ardent art amateur,
but an humble one, because he felt himself insufficiently gifted to
take part in actual creation.

Was Miss Forsythe there? Miss Forsythe was there, in her pink silk,
with cascade after cascade of ruffled flounces to take away the
appalling height and thinness of her figure. Was Mrs. Moozer there?
Dimly discernible, yes, backed into a corner and no longer mistress of
her own house, though ineffectually trying to assert herself above a
determined leadership. Also were there Mrs. Ranger, who was trying
hard to learn to dote; Mrs. Priestly, who prided herself on a marked
resemblance to Madame Melba, and had a high C which shattered
chandeliers; and Mrs. Hispin, whose troublesome mustache in nowise
interfered with her mad passion for the collection of antiques, which,
fortunately consisting of early chromos, could be purchased cheaply in
the vicinity of Blakeville; and Mrs. Bubble, whose specialty was the
avoidance of all subjects connected with domestic science. Many other
equally earnest and cultured ladies flocked about J. Rufus, as bees
around a buckwheat blossom, until the capable and masterly president,
by a careful accident arranging her skirts so that one inch of silken
hose was visible, tapped her little silver gavel for order.

There ensued the regular reports