From the day when Dorris Kincaid had come over with the gray glass
vase and her repeated thanks, when the flowers had done their
ministry and faded, there had been little simple courtesies, each
way, between the opposite houses; and once Kenneth and his sister
had taken tea with the Ripwinkleys, and they had played "crambo"
and "consequences" in the evening. The real little game of
"consequences," of which this present friendliness was a link, was
going on all the time, though they did not stop to read the lines as
they folded them down, and "what the world said" was not one of the
items in their scheme of it at all.

It would have been something worth while to have followed Hazel as
she went her rounds, asking quietly at each house to see Mrs. This
or That, "as she had a message;" and being shown, like a little
representative of an almost extinct period, up into the parlor, or
the dressing-room of each lady, and giving her quaint errand.

"I am Hazel Ripwinkley," she would say, "and my mother sends her
compliments, and would like to have Lilian,"--or whoever
else,--"come at four o'clock to-day, and spend the afternoon and
take tea. I'm to have a little party such as she used to have, and
nobody is to be much dressed up, and we are only to play games."

"Why, that is charming!" cried Mrs. Ashburne; for the feeling of
her own sweet early days, and the old B---- Square house, came over
her as she heard the words. "It is Lilian's music afternoon; but
never mind; give my kind compliments to your mother, and she will be
very happy to come."

And Mrs. Ashburne stooped down and kissed Hazel, when she went away.