Mrs. Campbell: "_I_ am. Mrs. Stevenson is bowed to the earth; Colonel Murphree is overjoyed; the Misses Ja--" Campbell, putting his paper down: "Look here, Amy. Do you know that you have one little infinitesimal ewe-lamb of a foible? You think too much of young men." Mrs. Campbell: "_Younger_ men, you mean. And _you_ have a multitude of perfectly mammoth peccadilloes. You interrupt." She goes on opening and reading her letters. "Well, I didn't expect the Macklines _could_; but everybody seems to be coming." Campbell: "You pay them too much attention altogether. It spoils them; and one of these days you'll be getting some of them in love with you, and _then_ what will you do?" Mrs. Campbell, with affected distraction: "What _are_ you talking about? I'd refer them to you, and you could kill them. I suppose you killed lots of people in California. That's what you always gave me to understand." She goes on with her letters. Campbell: "I never killed a single human being that I can remember; but there's no telling what I might do if I were provoked. Now, there's that young Welling. He's about here under my feet all the time; and he's got a way lately of coming in through the window from the piazza that's very intimate. He's a nice fellow enough, and sweet, as you say. I suppose he has talent, too, but I never heard that he had set any of the adjacent watercourses on fire; and I don't know that he could give the Apollo Belvedere many points in beauty and beat him." Mrs. Campbell: "_I_ do. Mrs. and Miss Rice accept, and her friend Miss Greenway, who's staying with her, and--yes! here's one from Mr. Welling! _Oh_, how glad I am! Willis, dearest, if I _could_ be the means of bringing those two lovely young creatures together, I should be _so_ happy! _Don't_ you think, now, he _is_ the most delicate-minded, truly refined, exquisitely modest young fellow that ever was?" She presses the unopened note to her corsage, and leans eagerly forward entreating a sympathetic acquiescence. Campbell: "Well, as far as I can remember my own youth, no. But what does he say?" Mrs. Campbell, regarding the letter: "I haven't looked yet. He writes the _most_ characteristic hand, for a man, that I ever saw. And he has the divinest taste in perfumes! Oh, I wonder what _that_ is? Like a memory--a regret." She presses it repeatedly to her pretty nose, in the endeavor to ascertain. Campbell: "Oh, hello!" Mrs. Campbell, laughing: "Willis, you _are_ delightful. I should like to see you really jealous once." Campbell: "You won't, as long as I know my own incomparable charm. But give me that letter, Amy, if you're not going to open it. I want to see whether Welling is going to come." Mrs. Campbell, fondly: "Would you _really_ like to open it? I've half a mind to let you, just for a reward." Campbell: "Reward! What for?" Mrs. Campbell: "Oh, I don't know. Being so nice." Campbell: "That's something I can't help. It's no merit. Well, hand over the letter."