there was anything he could do for me.

"Yes, indeed," I assured him. "Come in and talk to me." He looked shy
and surprised. I insisted. Then Tom's aunt called me and, drawing me
hastily into a corner, demanded why I was inviting a servant into her
drawing-room.

"Servant! He looks like a senator," I protested. "He's dressed exactly
like every other man at the party and he looks twice as important as
most of them."

"Didn't you notice he addressed you as 'Madam'?" pursued Aunt Elizabeth.

"But it 's perfectly proper to call a married woman 'Madam.'
Foreigners always do," I defended.

"Can't you tell a servant when you see one?" inquired the old lady
icily.

I begged to know how one could. All Boston was summed up in her answer:
"You are supposed to know the other people."

Tom's wife could have drowned in a thimble.


The third day of our visit, we were at the dinner table, when I saw Aunt
Elizabeth's face change--for the worse. Her head went up higher and her
upper lip drew longer. Finally she turned to me.

"Why do you cut your meat like a dog's dinner?" she snapped.