back from those long-ago voyages bales and bales of splendid
Oriental fabrics--stiff rustling silks and slinky clinging crepes
and indescribably brilliant brocades shot with silver or with gold.
For nearly fifty years Mrs. Shears had worn dresses made from these
romantic stuffs and she was wearing them yet--in Cherryvale! They
were all made after the same pattern, gathered voluminous skirt and
fitted bodice and long flowing sleeves; and, with the small lace cap
she always wore on her white hair. Missy thought the old lady looked
as if she'd just stepped from the yellow-tinged pages of some
fascinating old book. She wished her own grandmother dressed like
that; of course she loved Grandma Merriam dearly and really wouldn't
have exchanged her for the world, yet, in contrast, she did seem
somewhat commonplace.

It was interesting to sit and look at Grandma Shears and to hear her
recount the Oriental adventures of her father, the sea captain. But
Tess gave Missy little chance to do this. Tess had heard and re-
heard the adventures to the point of boredom and custom had caused
her to take her grandmother's strange garb as a matter of course;
Tess's was a nature which craved--and generally achieved--novelty.

Just now her particular interest veered toward athleticism; she had
recently returned from a visit to Macon City and brimmed with
colourful tales of its "Country Club" life--swimming, golf, tennis,
horseback riding, and so forth. These pursuits she straightway set
out to introduce into drowsy, behind-the-times Cherryvale. But in
almost every direction she encountered difficulties: there was in
Cherryvale no place to swim except muddy Bull Creek--and the girls'
mothers unanimously vetoed that; and there were no links for golf;
and the girls themselves didn't enthuse greatly over tennis those