"Why, Edith!" exclaimed Sarah, rising, and holding up her hands, and opening wide her prudish eyes. Sarah's sense of the proper fitness of things old-maidenishly would not permit her even to meditate on such a horrible deed. "Do not be unduly alarmed, Sarah," calmly remarked Edith. "It was an accident--oh, such an extraordinary accident, Sarah, and so ridiculous on my part that I still feel the effects of it on my mirthful nature." "Tell me all about it, my dear Edith?" said Sarah, now buttoning up the back of Edith's dinner gown. "If you will not tell--promise?" "You have my promise, Edith; but you wouldn't keep such a secret from your mother, would you?" "I do not want to, Sarah; but I am afraid, if I tell her, she will scold me." "Now, what did you do, Edith?" asked Sarah. "Stood in the rain the longest time talking to the strange young man." "Why, Edith!" exclaimed Sarah, for the fifth or sixth time. "No why about it, Sarah. It was an unavoidable accident. I ran into him, he into me. My hat fell off, rolled into the gutter, and my umbrella was rendered limp in one of its poor wings. Now, could I help that, Sarah?" "Perhaps not." "Well, he recovered my hat, held his umbrella over me while I put it on again, gave me his umbrella and he took my crippled one." "Is that all?" "We talked some." "Talked? Good gracious!" "Yes, talked, Sarah--really talked." "Why, Edith!" "Now, Sarah, be sensible, and listen. He was so polite, so courteous--" "They're all that way," interrupted Sarah, a man hater. "--but him," returned Edith, not meaning it in the same sense that Sarah did. "I was going to say, Sarah, that I could not resist his good face." "Who is he?" asked Sarah, coldly. "John Winthrope!" "What does he do?" "Works in my father's office!" "Lordy!" exploded Sarah at this revelation, for really Sarah was the snob instead of Edith. "And you stopped to talk with him in the street?" "Sarah, you are mean--real mean--cruel, exasperating. Sarah, I will have nothing more to do with you, if you talk that way any more! I will get a new maid, or have none at all--that I will, Sarah! Now, take your choice!" This from Edith, who was usually so calm, so even tempered, and so reasonable in all matters. But Sarah had aroused her dormant nature by such a reference to class distinction, that Edith, in her liberal way of looking at the world in general, could not reconcile Sarah's views with justice, if each human being concerned was equally endowed morally, physically and mentally. "I will say no more, Edith," humbly surrendered the prudent Sarah. Dinner was announced, and Edith descended to the brilliancy of the great dining room, where her parents were awaiting her arrival to be seated with them. Edith was charming in her changed habiliment. Could John but see her now! But John had no password as yet to this rich home.