FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   >>  
icans. How you differ from the English! How is it that you catch fortune by the hair so?" "We are passionate and quick-witted." "And then you repudiate with ease." "Bah! you imitate Sydney Smith." "I did not mean in the sense of State bonds precisely." "I think," Osgood groaned, "that I begin to feel like a snob again. What shall I do to be saved?" "Go on in the groove that is making for you. I'll stand by and be the chorus. When I hear thy plaints of misery I will let fall the tear; but remember that 'laws determine even the fates.'" "Bosh!" Except a dispute between the Doctor and Osgood concerning a slouched hat, which the Doctor would not wear, the party succeeded in starting and arriving amicably at the Union in Saratoga. In a few hours Mrs. Formica knew who was there. The Trees were at the Union. Mrs. Senator Conch had taken a cottage; but the Senator himself had stopped at Albany for a day to confer with the Governor. Old Madam Funchal of Philadelphia was at Congress Hall, with her train, and Mrs. Romeo Pipps Bovis and husband, from Boston. All her friends were round her; that is, the traveling set she was in the habit of meeting; and her spirits rose to the occasion. These particulars she detailed, in a white muslin morning-dress, to Osgood, who, dressed in a new cream-colored suit, lounged in the doorway of a small parlor off the hall. He shouldered round just in time to come face to face with Lily Tree, who was passing on the arm of Barclay Dodge. She stopped, of course, to shake hands with Mrs. Formica, whose apparently warm kiss fell on the edge of a braid of her chestnut hair with the weight and coldness of a snow-flake. Her face settled into rigidity when she turned to speak to Osgood, and, like a transparent boy, he looked, with all the earnestness his gray eyes were capable of, straight into hers. Aunt Formica and Barclay read a story at once upon the text his countenance furnished; but they both made the mistake of believing that Lily had rejected him. Lily was too much occupied in managing her own feelings to divine Osgood's. The imperative necessity of concealment, which all tutored women feel, governed her. She laughed a great deal, though nobody said a witty thing, and kept her eyes going between Mrs. Formica and Barclay with a steadiness which equaled the movements of the wax women in the Broadway shop windows. Mr. Formica and Dr. Black added themselves to the party, and the relief
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   >>  



Top keywords:
Formica
 

Osgood

 

Barclay

 

stopped

 

Senator

 
Doctor
 
weight
 

chestnut

 
settled
 

rigidity


turned

 

coldness

 
parlor
 

shouldered

 
doorway
 

colored

 
lounged
 
apparently
 

transparent

 

passing


laughed

 

necessity

 

imperative

 

concealment

 

tutored

 

governed

 

relief

 

windows

 

equaled

 

steadiness


movements

 
Broadway
 

divine

 

dressed

 

straight

 
looked
 

earnestness

 
capable
 

countenance

 
furnished

occupied
 

managing

 
feelings
 
rejected
 

mistake

 

believing

 
groove
 

making

 
chorus
 

remember