Trains
and trolleys, intent on serving the interests of the great majority, took
their own courses and gave her guests no aid. If the evening turned cold or
blustery or brought a driving rain she would say:
"You can't go out in this. You must stay all night. We have room and to
spare."
If she wanted anybody to stay very much, she would even add: "I can't think
of your walking toward the lake with such a gale in your face,"--regardless
of the fact that the lake wind was the rarest of them all and that in nine
cases out of ten the rain or snow would be not in people's faces but at
their backs.
If she didn't want anybody to stay, she simply ordered out the car and
bundled him off. The delay in the offer of the car sometimes induced a
young man to remain. Tasteful pajamas and the promise of a suitably early
breakfast assured him that he had made no mistake.
Cope's first call was made, not on a tempestuous evening in the winter
time, but on a quiet Sunday afternoon toward the end of September. The day
was sunny and the streets were full of strollers moving along decorously
beneath the elms, maples and catalpas.
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