cleaning or a new carpeting, or a furbishing up in any way, the next
thing was always to light up and play it off,--to try it on to
somebody. What were houses for? And there was always somebody who
ought to be paid attention to; somebody staying with a friend, or a
couple just engaged, or if nothing else, it was her turn to have the
sewing-society; and so her rooms got aired. Of course she had to air
them now! The drawing-room, with its apricot and coffee-brown
furnishings, was lovely in the evening, and the crimson and garnet
in the dining-room was rich and cozy, and set off brilliantly her
show of silver and cut-glass; and then, there was the new, real,
sea-green China.

So the party was had. There were some people in town from New York;
she invited them and about a hundred more. The house lit up
beautifully; the only pity was that Mrs. Ledwith could not wear her
favorite and most becoming colors, buff and chestnut, because she
had taken that family of tints for her furniture; but she found a
lovely shade of violet that would hold by gas-light, and she wore
black Fayal lace with it, and white roses upon her hair. Mrs.
Treweek was enchanted with the brown and apricot drawing-room, and
wondered where on earth they had got that particular shade, for "my
dear! she had ransacked Paris for hangings in just that perfect,
soft, ripe color that she had in her mind and never could hit upon."
Mrs. MacMichael had pushed the grapes back upon her plate to examine
the pattern of the bit of china, and had said how lovely the
coloring was, with the purple and pale green of the fruit. And these
things, and a few more like them, were the residuum of the whole,
and Laura Ledwith was satisfied.

Afterward, "while they were in the way of it," Florence had a little