Sam's people have a summer home at the Cape. Perhaps you'll meet him
there again."

"Perhaps."

"Goodness! One would think you didn't want to."

"Why, I don't know that I do, particularly. Why should I?"

"Why should you! Mary Lathrop, I do think you are the queerest girl. You
don't talk like a girl at all. Sometimes I think you are as old as--as
Prissy." "Prissy" was the disrespectful nickname by which the young
ladies referred, behind her back, to Miss Priscilla Cabot.

Mary laughed. "Not quite, I hope," she said. "But I don't see why I
should be so very anxious to meet Crawford Smith. And I'm sure he isn't
anxious to meet me. If all the other girls are crazy about him, that
ought to be enough, I should think."

This astonishing profession of indifference to the fascination of the
football hero, indifference which Miss Barbara declared to be only
make-believe, was made on a Saturday. The next day, as Mrs. Wyeth
and Mary were on their way home from church, the former made an
announcement.

"We are to have a guest, perhaps guests, at dinner this noon," she
said. Sunday dinner at Mrs. Wyeth's was served, according to New England
custom, at one o'clock.

"Samuel, Mr. John Keith's son, is to dine with us," continued Mrs.