Well might we have wondered. Trouble began the very next day. As we went out on the train I noticed that Mary had on her best dress and hat. She had no bag with her, so I wondered how she meant to "settle" in such clothes. The Angel and I had on our worst. I comforted myself with the reflection that there would not be very much dirty work to do. This would in reality be a kid-glove moving, for Mr. Close had telephoned the day before that everything was ready for us to move in. I had even sent a cleaning woman for floors and windows. I had taken the precaution to bring a few silver knives, forks, and spoons in my bag. Then as we got off the train I stopped at a grocery and bought a loaf of bread, a tin of devilled ham, one of sardines, some butter, and a dozen eggs, so we were at least sure of our luncheon. We jumped out of the carriage almost before it had stopped, and, while Aubrey paid the man, I ran up the steps and into the house. Such a sight of confusion met my eyes! The old paper was piled in the middle of each floor, and not a new strip on any wall. One ceiling only in the whole house was finished. Not a hardwood floor had been laid. The lumber was piled in the hall. Not a chandelier was up. The ragged wires projected from their various holes in ceilings and walls. Where was my cleaning woman? Where were our workmen? Above all, where was the perfidious Mr. Close? There was no furnace fire, and the water was not turned on. I ran back and Aubrey shouted for the carriage, just turning out of the grounds, to come back. "Go to the plumbers!" I said, incoherently, "and to the electric light men, and to the agents, and see where the men are, and bring some brooms and buckets and send me a grocer's boy." He turned away, breathing vengeance. I felt sorry for Mr. Close. "And to the telephone company!" I cried, after the departing carriage. "And to--" but the driver lashed his horses, and I had to give up. I went back to Mary in her best dress. "Finished, is it?" she said, sniffing with indignation. "I suppose the agent thought we were flies, and could move in on the ceiling--as that's the only thing I can see about the house that's finished!" "Wait until Mr. Jardine sees the agent!" I said, ominously. "Then something else will be finished, besides the ceiling." "I hope he'll kill him!" said Mary, pleasantly. It was a real pleasure to witness the dismay in Mr. Close's face when Aubrey returned, bringing him, mentally, by the scruff of the neck. I have seen terriers yanked back to look at things they have "worried" in much the same manner that Mr. Close was fetched to Peach Orchard. "Just look, Mr. Close, if you please," I said, ominously polite. "You telephoned me yesterday and said you had been here personally and seen with your own eyes that everything was finished and the house in perfect readiness for us to move in." Mr. Close refused to meet my accusing eye. He turned green.