round three sides, the most imposing house in Cherryvale. Already
strings of lanterns were lighted on the lawn, blue and red and
yellow orbs. The lights made the trees and shrubs seem shadowy and
remote, mysterious creatures awhisper over their own business.

Not yet had many guests arrived, but almost immediately they
appeared in such droves that it seemed they must have come up
miraculously through the floor. The folding camp chairs which lined
the parlours and porches (the rented chairs always seen at
Cherryvale parties and funerals) were one moment starkly exposed and
the next moment hidden by light-hued skirts and by stiffly held,
Sunday-trousered dark legs. For a while that stiffness which
inevitably introduces a formal gathering of youngsters held them
unnaturally bound. But just as inevitably it wore away, and by the
time the folding chairs were drawn up round the little table where
"hearts" were to be played, voices were babbling, and laughter was
to be heard everywhere for no reason at all.

At Missy's table sat Raymond Bonner, looking handsomer than ever
with his golden hair and his eyes like black velvet pansies. There
was another boy who didn't count; and then there was the most
striking creature Missy had ever seen. She was a city girl visiting
in town, an older, tall, red-haired girl, with languishing, long-
lashed eyes. She wore a red chiffon dress, lower cut than was worn
in Cherryvale, which looked like a picture in a fashion magazine.
But it was not her chic alone that made her so striking. It was her
manner. Missy was, not sure that she knew what "sophisticated"
meant, but she decided that the visiting girl's air of self-
possession, of calm, almost superior assurance, denoted
sophistication. How eloquent was that languid way of using her fan!