't stand these English winters--and wrote me to come up.
But he was so sick that he left the Pegalls' about six o'clock."

"That was the letter which upset you."

"It was. I see old Bella Tyler kept her eyes peeled. I got the letter
and came up at once. I've only got one parent left, and he's too good to
be shoved away in a box underground while fools live. But here we are at
the Pegalls'. I hope you'll like the kind of circus they run.
Campmeetings are nothing to it."

The dwelling of the respectable family alluded to was a tolerably sized
house of red brick, placed in a painfully neat garden, and shut in from
the high road by a tall and jealous fence of green-painted wood. The
stout widow and two stout spinster daughters, who made up the inmates,
quite deserved Mrs. Vrain's epithet of "heavy." They were aggressively
healthy, with red cheeks, black hair, and staring black eyes devoid of
expression; a trio of Dutch dolls would have looked more intellectual.
They were plainly and comfortably dressed; the drawing-room was plainly
and comfortably furnished; and both house and inmates looked thoroughly
respectable and eminently dull. What such a hawk as Mrs. Vrain was doing
in this Philistine dove-cote, Lucian could not conjecture; but he
admired her tact in making friends with a family whose heavy gentility
assisted to ballast her somewhat light reputation; while the three of
their brains in unison could not comprehend her tricks, or the reasons
for which they were played.

"At all events, these three women are too honest to speak anything but
the truth," thought Lucian while undergoing the ordeal of being
presented. "So I'll learn for certain if Mrs. Vrain was really here on
Christmas Eve."

The Misses Pegall and their lace-capped mamma welcomed Lucian with heavy
good nature and much simpering, for they also had an eye to a comely
young man; but the cunning Lydia they kissed and embraced, and called
"dear" with much zeal. Mrs. Vrain, on her part, darted from one to the
other like a bird, pecking the red apples of their cheeks, and cast an
arch glance at Lucian to see if he admired her talent for manoeuvering.
Then cake and wine, port and sherry, were produced in the style of early
Victorian hospitality, from which epoch Mrs. Pegall dated, and all went
merry as a marriage bell, while Lydia laid her plans to have herself
exculpated in Lucian's eyes without being inculpated in those of the
family.

"We have just come