It was the youthful voice of her grandmother. She faced them again
with a little frown of feigned impatience.

"If you are going into the garden, throw something around your
shoulders."

"Thank you, grandmother; I have my lace."

Crossing the hall, she went into the front parlor, took from a
damask sofa a rare shawl of white lace and, walking to a mirror,
threw it over her head, absently noting the effect in profile. She
lifted this off and, breaking the rose from part of its stem,
pinned that on her breast. Then, stepping aside to one of the
large lofty windows, she stood there under the droop of the
curtains, sunk into reverie again and looking out upon the yard and
the street beyond.

Hardly a sound disturbed the twilight stillness. A lamplighter
passed, torching the grim lamps. A sauntering carrier threw the
evening newspaper over the gate, with his unintelligible cry. A
dog-cart rumbled by, and later, a brougham; people were not yet
returned from driving on the country turnpikes. Once, some belated
girls clattered past on ponies. But already little children,
bare-armed, bare-necked, swinging lanterns, and attended by proud
young mothers, were on their way to a summer-night festival in the
park. Up and down the street family groups were forming on the
verandas. The red disks of cigars could be seen, and the laughter
of happy women was wafted across the dividing fences and shrubbery,
and vines.