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"And they asked about Mrs. Bowditch's dance," Charlotte added with a little innocent craft.

"But I said that M'ma had been unable to decide. Of course I said that we would LIKE to go, and that you knew that, and would allow it if you possibly could."

"She wasn't at church, M'ma," said Charlotte, taken unawares and instinctively uneasy.

"Mrs. Roper said she had a heavy cold; she said she'd been sleeping on the sleeping porch."

"I asked Mrs. Roper to deliver it, M'ma. Wasn't that -- " Her voice faltered nervously. "Was it something you would have rather telephoned about?"

"I'll hook you, M'ma!" volunteered Charlotte.

"How do you do, Kenneth? I didn't know you were here!"

"How is your mother, Kenneth, and Dorothy?"

"It's lovely weather for tennis," she said encouragingly.

"We -- "

"No, I interrupted you!"

"Yes, indeed," Charlotte said

"Papa has had them all rolled; some men came down from town -- we had it all sodded, you know, last year."

"We must!"

"Any morning, Kenneth!"

"You'd better take a microscope!" said Charlotte wittily

"Isn't he nice!" Charlotte said

"I don't really want any," asserted Charlotte

"But can't I help you, Aunt Rachael?"Charlotte

"So sorry about you, Rachael!" said the slim, laceclad hostess calmly

"Here's Judy Moran! Nearly six, Judy, and we dine at seven on Sundays. But never mind, eat and drink your fill, my child."

"Oh, here you are, M'ma!" said Charlotte. "Are you ready to go?"

"Very," Charlotte said.

"I've been looking over old magazines in the library -- SO interesting!"

"Oh, no, M'ma," answered Charlotte

"Charley left me just after you did; he had an engagement with Straker." She reached for a macaroon, and ate it with a brightly disengaged air, her eyes, behind their not unbecoming glasses, studying the golf links with absorbed interest.

"No. I had it all to myself!" the girl answered pleasantly.

"I didn't think of it, M'ma," said Charlotte lucidly.

"If M'ma doesn't object," said the dutiful daughter.

"Isn't it a wonderful afternoon, Aunt Rachael?" Charlotte said

"I do think they've picked out such a charming site for the club!"

"Poor M'ma, she would so like me to be a little, fluffy, empty-headed butterfly of a girl, and I know I disappoint her! It isn't that I don't like boys," pursued Charlotte, the smooth and even stream of her words beginning to remind Rachael of Florence, "or that they don't like me; they're always coming to me with their confidences and asking my advice, but it's just that I can't take them seriously. If a boy wants to kiss me, why, I say to him in perfect good faith, 'Why shouldn't you kiss me, John? When I'm fond of a person I always like to kiss him, and I'm sure I'm fond of you!'" Charlotte stopped for a short laugh full of relish.

"Of course that takes the wind out of their sails completely," she went on, "and we have a good laugh over it, and are all the better friends! That is," said Charlotte, thoroughly enjoying herself, "I treat my men friends exactly as I do my girl friends. Do you think that's so extraordinary, Aunt Rachael? Because I can't do anything different, you know -- really I can't!"

"Of course, some day I shall marry," the girl added in brisk decision, "because I love a home, and I love children, and I think I would be a good mother to children. But meanwhile, my books and my friends mean a thousand times more to me than all these stupid boys! Why is it other girls are so crazy about boys, Aunt Rachael?" asked Charlotte, brightly sensible.

"Of course I like them, and all that, but I can't see the sense of all these notes and telephones and flirtations. I told Vivvie Sartoris that I was afraid I knew all these boys too well; of course Jack and Kent and Charley are just like brothers! It all" -- Charlotte smiled, signed, shook her disillusioned young head -- "it all seems so awfully SILLY to me!" she said

"Of course I know Billy doesn't agree with me, and Billy has plenty of admiration of a sort, and I suppose that satisfies her! But, in short," finished Charlotte, giving Rachael's arm a squeeze as they came out upon the tennis courts, "in short, you have an exacting little niece, Auntie dear, and I'm afraid the man who is going to make her happy must be out of the ordinary!"

"How do you do, Kent?" said Charlotte

"It SEEMS to be," said Charlotte

"Shall I take you down, Bishop?" Charlotte asked

"Aunt Rachael" -- the old name came naturally after seven years -- "you'll think I'm quite crazy coming here this way" -- Charlotte, as always, was justifying her shy little efforts at living -- "but M'ma was busy, and" -- the old, nervous gasp -- "and it seemed only friendly to come and -- and inquire -- "

"I know how odd, how very odd it must look," said Charlotte, managing a wet smile, "and my crying -- perfectly absurd -- I can't think why I'm so silly!"

"I was afraid so," she stammered huskily. "Elfrida Hamilton told me. I was so -- sorry -- "

"Oh, n-n-not very well, Aunt Rachael -- that is, we didn't see each other often, since" -- Rachael knew since when, and liked Charlotte for the clumsy substitute -- "since Billy was married. I know Charlie called, but M'ma didn't tell me until weeks later, and then we were on the ocean. We met now and then, and once he telephoned, and I think he would have liked to see me, but M'ma felt so strongly -- there was no way. And then last summer -- we h-h- happened to meet, he and I, at Jane Cook's wedding, and we had quite a talk. I knew M'ma would be angry, but it just seemed as if I couldn't think of it then. And we talked of the things we liked, you know, the sort of house we both liked -- not like other people's houses!" Charlotte's plain young face had grown bright with the recollection, but now her voice sank lifelessly again. "But M'ma made me promise never to speak to him again, and of course I promised," she said

"I suppose I couldn't -- speak to him a moment, Aunt Rachael?"

"I see," she said in turn. "Thank you, Aunt Rachael, thanks ever so much. I -- I wish you'd tell his grandmother how sorry I am. I -- suppose Fanny and I had better go now."

"I always loved you," gulped Charlotte, "and I would have come to see you, if M'ma -- And of course it was nothing but the merest friendship b-between Charlie and me, only we -- we always seemed to like each other."