To the Scott household the closing of the college for the summer brought little change. The time that Dr. Scott had spent in the classroom he would spend now in his study; the time that Cora had spent with her books she would spend embroidering. Mrs. Scott's life would know at first no change, but in August she would take Cora to Atlantic City to meet Walter, and Dr. Scott would spend a month in heavenly quiet and with an entirely negligible indigestion. When Evan Utterly reached the porch steps, Mrs. Scott stood still at the foot of the stairway which she was about to ascend and looked and listened, regretting the chance which had taken her husband to the porch before her. Somehow Utterly in his beautiful white clothes had escaped her attention at the morning exercises, or she would have had up to this time an uncomfortable period of speculation. Vaguely provoked because she was not summoned at once, she stood still, her eyes roving from the parlor, with its gilt chairs and its pale upholstery, to the sitting-room, with its table spread with Cora's presents. There could be no better time to entertain a stranger! She heard Utterly comment upon the Attic beauty of the campus; then his voice sank. He was still talking about Waltonville's charm, but she suspected a confidential communication. She determined to wait until she heard more. There was only one situation in life in which she was truly patient and in such a situation she now waited and listened. When a single clear statement reached her alert ears, she moved nearer to the door. The stranger had said that he was a member of the staff of "Willard's Magazine"! She had a passion for literature, she believed, and here was doubtless a very celebrated literary man at her door! She laid her hand lightly upon the latch, thereby producing a little sound which the stranger could not hear, but which Dr. Scott could not mistake. Surely he would rise at once and invite her to join them! But her husband gave no sign of summoning her. Patience became impatience. She could hear in his voice the tone which he assumed when he was bored or when he was talking with persons whom he did not like. She could still hear only unintelligible fragments of the conversation. She clicked the latch again. Dr. Scott did not like the stranger, either for himself or his clothes or his speech. It was a period when Anglomania affected the rising generation and this youth used English pronunciations as he might have used a monocle, with evident and painful effort. In what he had to say Dr. Scott was not the least interested. He had begun to open the mail which lay on the chair beside him and he wished desperately that the young man would state his errand and go.