The boat was beginning to stop, and the passengers were hurrying from the deck, which Elithe was almost the last to leave. On the wharf crowds of people were gathered,—hundreds it seemed to her,—and by the time she was in their midst, pushed and jostled and deafened by the hackmen’s cries for the different hotels, she lost her head completely and wondered how she was ever to get through it, and if her aunt were there and how she was to know her, and what had become of her trunk. She found it at last on top of a Saratoga, with both hinges broken now and the lid kept in place by the rope, but still pushed up enough to show a bit of her second best dress through the aperture. It did look strange perched on top of the handsome Saratoga, but she did not realize how strange till she heard some one near her say very impatiently, “My gracious, how came this rubbish here! I hope you don’t think it belongs to me. Can’t you read the name, Elithe Hansford, on it? Take it away.” Turning, she saw Clarice Percy ordering a porter to remove the obnoxious baggage, which he did with a bang. Close behind her was Paul Ralston, who, the moment he saw her, called out cheerily, “Oh, here you are. I’ve looked everywhere for you, thinking you might get dazed in this infernal jam, the biggest, I do believe, I’ve ever seen here. Everybody in town has come to meet somebody, and the rest to look on. Clarice, this is Miss Elithe Hansford from Montana. You remember, I told you she was on the boat. Miss Hansford, Miss Percy.” If ever eyes expressed utter indifference if not contempt, those of Clarice did, as, with a swift glance, they took Elithe’s measure, from her hat and gown to her gloves and shoes. That she was a fright and a nobody she decided at once. But Paul had presented her, and she must show a semblance of civility. Taking Elithe’s hand, she held it so high that Elithe, who had not learned the fashion, wondered what it meant. She gave it a little shake and said, “Glad to meet you, I am sure.” Nothing could be colder or haughtier than her voice and manner, and Elithe felt it keenly and was going away when Paul, with his usual kindness of heart, said to her, “I don’t see your aunt, but she must be here. I’ll look for her. Stay where you are, both of you. I’ll be back in a minute.” While he was gone Elithe kept guard over her despised trunk, trying to adjust the hasp in its place and pushing back the fold of her dress showing so conspicuously. Clarice turned her back upon her and stood impatiently tapping her foot and humming to herself. “She is very proud, and if all the people here are like her, I shall want to go home at once,” Elithe was thinking, when Paul came hurrying up and with him a young man so nearly resembling him in figure and height and general appearance that but for their dress one might be readily mistaken for the other when his back was turned.