“She will take what we choose,” Amy replied, and her brother answered: “Well, then, get the most becoming and least objectionable. They are all young girls of twenty or thereabouts, and I won’t have them looking like grandmothers. How will this do?” and by chance Alex. selected the smallest and daintiest and prettiest of them all, as well as the most expensive. But expense was nothing to him. He was always wanting a good time for himself and others, and meant to have it at Maplehurst. “A jam up good time for the whole of us, hired help and all,” he said to himself, using a bit of slang which horrified Amy, but which she forgave because he was her big, unselfish, good-natured brother, giving the good time to others, if there was but one to be had. His mother had hired Mrs. Groves, and he had left the selection of his staff entirely to her, feeling no particular interest in any except the four waitresses—his quartette he called them. He was somewhat particular about these, as he would see them three times a day. He wanted them near the same age and size and good-looking. “Not so good as to detract from the young ladies, but good,” he said to Mrs. Groves, who felt that she had filled the bill well, possibly a little too well with No. 1, who certainly was handsome, and whose manner would always be that of a lady whatever she was doing, and who would be noticed wherever she was. The quartette had come to Maplehurst on the same train and had been received by Mrs. Groves, who had assigned them their rooms, one to each, greatly to Sherry’s satisfaction. She did not mean to be proud or exclusive, but she wanted a room to herself, where she could sometimes be alone. For the rest she meant to be one with her companions,—Susie, the saleslady, Annie, the stenographer, and Polly, the restaurant waitress; Nos. 2, 3 and 4, as Mrs. Groves designated them. They were bright, good girls, glad for this outing and inclined to be very friendly with Sherry, whom they at once recognized as a little different from themselves and treated her accordingly. Sherry had been nearly a week at Maplehurst, and had been drilled daily and made to wait upon Mrs. Groves as she was expected to wait upon the coming guests. She proved the most apt of all the girls, and for this reason was assigned to the Marsh table. “You will have Mr. and Mrs. Marsh, and Miss Marsh, and their cousin, Miss Doane, who lives with them, and two or three more, the Saltus family later on, perhaps, and you must be very particular as the Saltuses live in even greater style than the Marshes,” Mrs. Groves had said, and at the mention of the Saltuses the hot blood had flamed into Sherry’s face and then for a moment left it very white as she wondered what they would say to find her there,—a machine, as Mrs. Groves had said she must be, never smiling, and never seeming to see or hear what was being done and giving no sign that she had ever seen them before unless they made some advances.