“Walesy, why don’t they come!” she exclaimed with an impatient frown, pulling the cat’s tail while it protested with growl and claw. “I heard the steamboat a long time ago.” Her eyes sought the glimpses of sparkling river between the trees and she descried a thin banner of smoke moving up-stream. “Yes, there it goes! They’ll surely be here soon! Now don’t make such a fuss about having your tail pulled. You’ll just have to get used to it!” She began to whistle softly, stopped, cast a backward glance at the open door, made a little grimace and struck again into her tune, louder than before. Up the street, under the drooping white masses of locust bloom, came a two-seated carriage. “Mother! They’re coming! They’re right here!” she called. Then with the kitten still in her arm she scurried down the path between the walls of fragrant lilac, her crinolined skirt giving glimpses of trimly slippered feet as it tilted from side to side. Unlatching the gate she stepped upon its lower cross-piece and swung back upon it as far as it would go. “Father! Rhoda!” she called out joyously, and was herself welcomed with “Well, Charlotte!” and a kiss by her father and a laughing embrace by her sister. One of the tall, square gate-posts bore the sign, “Dr. Amos M. Ware.” “Now let’s take in the things!” cried Charlotte. “I’m just dying to see what you’ve brought! Here, Jim,” to the negro who was holding the horses, “come and carry in these bundles.” Within the house there was eager cross-fire of question and answer, punctuated by frequent exclamations of delight, as the two sisters and their mother unwrapped the parcels and examined their contents. “This is for mother,” said Rhoda, shaking out a light wool wrap. “They’re wearing these little shawls so much this spring. Charlotte, doesn’t she look nice in it!” Throwing her arms around her mother’s shoulders Rhoda kissed her twice and then rushed back to the table piled with packages. “And I’ve got the sweetest bonnet for you, Charlotte!” she went on, opening a bandbox. “There! isn’t that lovely, mother?” She tied the strings under Charlotte’s chin and all three clustered about the mirror as the girl critically surveyed herself therein. The bonnet covered her head, in the fashion of the days “before the war,” and the wreath of flowers inside its front made a dainty frame that seemed to be trying to compel into demureness the saucy face with its tip-tilted nose and mischievous brown eyes.