“Don’t be angry, John,” pleaded Lucy humbly. “I won’t say any more about her.” “I don’t want you to have any more to do with her, either,” he dictated with suppressed vehemence. “All right, John,” Lucy submitted again. * * * * * The following Sunday Mrs. Hamilton invited John and Lucy to tea. “I suppose we might as well accept,” John had remarked when Lucy told him of the invitation. “We’ve no place else to go.” They arrived early. The summer was established and a crimson sunset ended a brilliant day. Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton were seated on the porch and both rose as their visitors came up the walk. “We were enjoying the view over our park,” Mrs. Hamilton observed facetiously, nodding toward the vacant ground which permitted an unobstructed view of the sky, and extending her hand as she spoke. “Yes, indeed. There are worse places to live than Rosedene,” declared the doctor, pulling forward a rocking chair for Lucy. “You used to stay at home so closely,” Mrs. Hamilton told her guests when the party was seated, “but now you seem to go out ’most every evening, and we want to see something of you.” “How pretty!” interrupted Lucy uneasily, calling their attention to the thin new moon as it rose above the straggling houses. “I suppose you are missing your mother,” Mrs. Hamilton resumed when the conversation paused again. “It was so long since you had seen her. I envied you having her with you. I haven’t seen my own mother for over two years. I was surprised when the doctor told me Mrs. Merwent was going to be married, though I don’t know why I should have been. She is certainly a wonderfully well preserved woman. I suppose you and Mr. Winter will go to the wedding.” “I don’t think so.” Lucy glanced at John and Doctor Hamilton, who had withdrawn a little from the two women and were smoking together. “I don’t care much for the Hamiltons,” John commented, as he and Lucy were on their way home. “I want to make friends that are not so dull and commonplace. Their idea of high-brow art goes about as far as the pictures on the popular magazine covers. I think I’ll join the Craftsman’s Club. Mathews of Layard’s belongs and he’s offered several times to put my name up. It will cost fifty dollars a year dues. A lot of artists belong and it would be a good place to spend an evening now and then.” As they were preparing to retire John returned again to the subject of society. “I think we ought to give a little dinner, Lucy,” he said. “We have been several places and we ought to do something to pay them all back. Besides, in that way you gradually get a larger circle of acquaintances.” “All right, John,” agreed Lucy, “if you would like to--if you think we can afford it. I’ve no dinner gown, you know.” “Oh, go ahead and get something. We’ll make up the list of people we want tomorrow night,” he insisted. * * * * * The next evening at dinner he burst forth in a sudden impatient tirade.