"All bores are respectable people," replied Mrs. Marsden; "if they were otherwise, it would not be in their power to bore us, for we could cut them and cast them off at once. How very unlucky! What will Mrs. Washington Potts think of her--and the Montagues too, if they _should_ come? Still we must not affront her, as you know she is rich." "What can her riches signify to us?" said Albina; "she has a married daughter." "True," replied Mrs. Marsden, "but you know riches should always command a certain degree of respect, and there are such things as legacies." "After all, according to the common saying, 'tis an ill wind that blows no good;' the parlours having been freshly papered, we can easily persuade Aunt Quimby that they are too damp for her to sit in, and so we can make her stay up stairs all the evening." At this moment the old lady's voice was heard at the door, discharging the porter who had brought her baggage on his wheelbarrow; and the next minute she was in the front parlour. Mrs. Marsden and Albina were properly astonished, and, properly delighted at seeing her; but each, after a pause of recollection, suddenly seized the old lady by the arms and conveyed her into the entry, exclaiming, "Oh! Aunt Quimby! Aunt Quimby! this is no place for you." "What's the meaning of all this?" cried Mrs. Quimby; "why won't you let me stay in the parlour?" "You'll get your death," answered Mrs. Marsden, "you'll get the rheumatism. Both parlours have been newly papered to-day, and the walls are quite wet." "That's a bad thing," said Mrs. Quimby, "a very bad thing. I wish you had put off your papering till next spring. Who'd have thought of your doing it this day of all days?" "Oh! Aunt Quimby," said Albina, "why did you not let us know that you were coming?" "Why, I wanted to give you an agreeable surprise," replied the old lady. "But tell me why the rooms are so decked out, with flowers hanging about the looking-glasses and lamps, and why the candles are dressed with cut paper, or something that looks like it?" "We are going to have a party to-night," said Albina. "A party! I'm glad of it. Then I'm come just in the nick of time." "I thought you had long since given up parties," said Mrs. Marsden, turning pale. "No, indeed--why should I--I always go when I am asked--to be sure I can't make much figure at parties now, being in my seventy-fifth year. But Mrs. Howks and Mrs. Himes, and several others of my old friends, always invite me to their daughters' parties, along with Mary; and I like to sit there and look about me, and see people's new ways. Mary had a party herself last winter, and it went off very well, only that both the children came out that night with the measles; and one of the lamps leaked, and the oil ran all over the side-board and streamed down on the carpet; and, it being the first time we ever had ice-cream in the house, Peter, the stupid black boy, not only brought saucers to eat it in, but cups and saucers both."