fickle, but mamma, whose taste was perfect, had decided against all
blue, and would Guy please furnish the room with drab trimmed with blue.
"It must be a very delicate shade of drab," she wrote, and lest he
should get too intense an idea, she would call it a _tint_ of a _shade_
of drab, or, better yet, a _hint_ of a tint of a shade of drab would
describe exactly what she meant, and be so entirely unique, and lovely,
and recherché.

Guy never swears, and seldom uses slang of any kind, but this was a
little too much, and with a most rueful expression of countenance he
asked me "what in thunder I supposed a hint of a tint of a shade of drab
could be."

I could not enlighten him, and we finally concluded to leave it to the
upholsterer, to whom Guy telegraphed in hot haste, bidding him hunt New
York over for the desired shade. Where he found it I never knew, but
find it he did, or something approximating to it, a faded, washed-out
color, which seemed a cross between wood-ashes and pale skim milk. A
sample was sent up for Guy's approval, and then the work commenced
again, when order number three came in one of those dainty little
billets which used to make Guy's face radiant with happiness. Daisy had
changed her mind again and gone back to the blue, which she always
preferred as most becoming to her complexion.

Guy did not say a single word, but he took the next train for New York
and stayed there till the furniture was done and packed for Cuylerville.
As I did not know where he was stopping, I could not forward him two
little missives which came during his absence, and which bore the
Indianapolis post-mark. I suspect he had a design in keeping his hotel
from me, and whether Daisy changed her mind again or not I never knew.