"Annie Lizzie, Miss Wax ain't eatin' a thing. You tell her to let the folks wait for their tea a spell, and have somethin' herself. Here! take her this orange cream, and tell her I made it, and I expect her to eat it. And--Annie Lizzie, look here! you tell Mr. Homer I don't want he should touch that frozen puddin'. It's too rich, tell him; but he can have all the strawberry and vanilla he wants. I ain't goin' to have him sick after this, all worked up as he is."
There were forty-seven different kinds of cake, all "named varieties," as the flower catalogues say. Every housewife in the village had sent her "specialty," from Miss Wax's famous harlequin round down to the Irish christening loaf of good old Mrs. Flanagan, the laundress, who was helping Diploma Crotty wash cups and plates in the kitchen. Mrs. Flanagan refused to come in, spite of Mr. Homer's urgent invitation.
"I thank ye, dear!" she said. "I thank ye kindly, but I'll not come in among the Quality. I wish ye well, Mr. Homer. May no dog ever bite ye but mine, and I'll kape a cat!"
Through the crowd, here and there, moved Mr. Homer and Mr. Pindar, bowing and smiling, waving and flapping, happiest of all the happy throng. Under the genial sun of cheer and encouragement that had been shining on him during the last two weeks, since the Procession had been given up, Mr. Pindar had grown less and less abrupt and jerky, and more and more like his brother; and the village readily accorded him a share of the benevolent affection with which they regarded Mr. Homer.
"I always said there warn't a mite of harm in Home," said Seth Weaver, "and I begin to think there ain't none in Pindar, either. They come out the same nest, and I expect they're the same settin' of aigs, if they be speckled different. Hatched out kinder queer chicks, old Mis' Hollopeter did, but, take 'em all round, I dunno but they're full as good as barn-door fowls, and they certingly do better when it comes to crowin'."
And when at last it was over, and, with hand-shakings and congratulations, the tide of visitors had flowed out through the door and down the garden path, the two brothers stood and looked at each other with happy eyes.
"It has been a great occasion, Brother Pindar!" said Mr. Homer.