In view of these rather remarkable facts I think it really was a tribute to Cicely Hamlin that the many discussions of her as a conspicuous addition to the youngest set had boiled down to the single descriptive adjective, 'tactful.' Though the characterisation seems not altogether happy; for the word, to me, connotes something of conscious skill and management--as my Crabb put it: 'TACTFUL. See Diplomatic'--and Cicely was not, certainly not in those days, a manager.
'No, she'll shake hands and it might get in the way.
'Put it on the table--that's the thing!--on a corner where she'll see it.
'Then some time when we can't think of anything to talk about, I'll say--"Thought you might like a few chocolates." Sorta offhand. Prevent there being a lull in the conversation.
'Why not? Shucks! Can't go on with "You" and "Say!" Why can't I just do it naturally? The way Herb would, or Elbow, or those fellows.
'"How'd' you do, Cicely! Come on, let's take a walk."
'No. "Good-evening, Cicely. I thought maybe you'd like to take a walk. There's a moonrise over the lake about half-past eight." That's better.
'Wonder if Herb'll be there. He'd hardly think to come so early, though. Be all right if I can get her away from the house by eight.'
He paused, held up his watch to the light from the corner, then rushed on.
'Maybe she'd ask me to sit him out, anyway.'
But his lips clamped shut on this. It was just the sort of thing Cicely wouldn't do. He knew it.
This sudden thought brought bitterness. A snicker had run its course about town--in his eager self-absorption he had wholly forgotten--when Alfred Knight, confident in an engagement to call, had hired a horse and buggy at McAllister's. The matter of an evening drive _a deux_ had been referred to Cicely's aunt. As a result the horse had stood hitched outside more than two hours only to be driven back to the livery, stable by the gloomy Al.
'Shucks, though! Al's a fish! Don't blame her!'
He walked stiffly in among the trees and shrubs of the old Dexter Smith place and mounted the rather imposing front steps.
That purchase of the Dexter Smith place was typical of Madame Watt at the time. She was riding high. She had money. Two acres of lawn, fine old trees, a great square house of Milwaukee brick, high spacious rooms with elaborately moulded plaster ceilings and a built-on conservatory and a barn that you could keep half a dozen carriages in! It was one of only four or five houses in Sunbury that the _Voice_ and the _Gleaner_ rejoiced to call 'mansions.' And it was the only one that could have been bought. The William B. Snows, like the Jenkinses and the de Casselles (I don't know if it has been explained before that the accepted local pronunciation was Dekasells,) lived in theirs. And even after the elder Dexter Smith died Mrs Smith would hardly have sold the place if the children hadn't nagged her into it. Young Dex wanted to go to New York. And at that it was understood that Madame Watt paid two prices.