Didn't seem to be. And we'd have had a perfectly good chat if it hadn't been for Doris. Such a restless young female! First she wants to drum something out on the piano herself. Then she must have Vee come show her how it ought to go. Next she wants to practice a new fancy dance, and so on. She keeps Westy trottin' around, and Vee comin' and goin', and things stirred up gen'rally. One minute she's gigglin' hysterical over nothin' at all, and the next she's poutin' sulky. Anyway, she managed to queer the best part of the evenin', and I'd just settled down with Vee in a corner when the big hall clock starts to chime ten, and in through the draperies marches Aunty. It ain't any accidental droppin' in, either. She glances at me stern and suggestive and nods towards the door. So it was all over! "Say," I whispers to Vee as I does a draggy exit, "if Doris is to be with us again, would you mind my bringin' a clothesline and ropin' her to the piano?" Maybe it wa'n't some discouragin' a week later to find the same pair still on the job, with Doris as much of a peace disturber as ever. I got a little more of her history sketched out by Vee that night. Seems that Doris didn't really belong, for all her airs. Her folks had only lived up in the West 70's for four or five years, and before that---- "Well, you know," says Vee, archin' her eyebrows expressive, "on the East Side somewhere." You see, Father had been comin' strong in business of late,--antiques and house decoratin'. I remember havin' seen the name over the door of his big Fifth-ave. shop,--Leo Ull. You know there's about five hundred per cent, profit in that game when you get it goin', and while Pa Ull might have started small, in an East 14th Street basement, with livin' rooms in the rear, he kept branchin' out,--gettin' to Fourth-ave., and fin'lly to Fifth, jumpin' from a flat to an apartment, and from that to a reg'lar house. So the two boys went to college, and later on little Doris, with long braids down her back and weeps in her eyes, is sent off to a girls' boardin' school. By the time her turn came too, the annual income was runnin' into six figures. Besides, Doris was the pet. And when Pa and Ma Ull sat down to pick out a young ladies' culture fact'ry for her the process was simple. They discarded all but three of the catalogues, savin' them that was printed on the thickest paper and havin' the most halftone pictures, and then put the tag on the one where the rates was highest. Near Washington, I think it was; anyway, somewhere South,--board and tuition, two thousand dollars and up; everything extra, from lead pencils to lessons in court etiquette; and the young ladies limited to ten new evenin' dresses a term.