Belle, dangling the slipper, called in now to Lottie: "Nice party, Lot?" "Oh, nice enough." "Who was there?" "The girls. You know." "Is her flat pretty? What did she serve?" "Chicken salad with aspic--hot biscuits--olives--a cake----" "Really!" "Oh, yes. A party." "Is she happy with her Orville--now that she's waited ten years for him?" "Yes--at least, she was until this afternoon." "Until!--Oh, come in here, Lottie. I can't shout at you like----" Lottie, knitting as she walked, came back into the living room. Charley followed her after a moment; came over to her father, perched herself on a slippery arm of Ole Bull and leaned back, her shoulder against his. Lottie stood, still knitting. She smiled a little. "Beck Schaefer was on one of her reckless rampages. She teased Celia until Celia cried." "About what? Teased her about what? Pretty kind of guest, I must say." "Oh, marriage. Marriage and happiness and--she said every unmarried woman was a failure." "That shouldn't have bothered Celia. She's married, safe enough. She certainly had Beck there." "Beck intimated that Orville wasn't worth waiting ten years for." "Most men aren't," spoke up great-aunt Charlotte from her corner, "and their wives don't know it until after they've been married ten years; and then it's too late. Celia had plenty of time to find it out first and she married him anyway. That's better. She'll be happy with him." "Charlotte Thrift!" called Charley, through the laughter. "You _couldn't_ be so wise just living to be seventy-four. Oh, you hoop-skirted gals weren't so prunes-and-prismy. You've had a past. I'm sure of it." "How d'you suppose I could have faced the future all these years if I hadn't had!" retorted Aunt Charlotte. "That Schaefer girl had better go slow." Henry Kemp blew a whole flock of smoke-rings for Charley's edification at which Charley, unedified, announced that she could blow better rings than any of these in size, number, and velocity with a despised gold-tipped perfumed cigarette and cold-sore on the upper lip. "Some day," he predicted, "some day she'll run away with a bell-hop. Just the type." "Who's run away with a bell-hop?" Mrs. Payson chose this unfortunate moment to enter the living room after her kitchen conference. "Beck Schaefer," said Charley, mischievously. You should have seen, then, the quick glance of terror that Mrs. Payson darted at Lottie. You might almost have thought that Lottie had been the one who had succumbed to the lure of youth in blue suit and brass buttons. "Beck! She hasn't! She didn't! Beck Schaefer!" "No mama, she hasn't. Henry just thinks she will--in time."