CHAPTER V.
The arbiters of social fate in Middleville assembled at Mrs.Maynard's on a Monday afternoon, presumably to partake of tea.

Seldom, however, did they meet without adding zest to the occasion by a pricking down of names.
Mrs.Wrapp was the leading spirit of this self-appointed tribunal--a circumstance of expanding, resentment to Mrs.Maynard, who had once held the reins with aristocratic hands.

Mrs.Kingsley, the third member of the great triangle, claimed an ancestor on the Mayflower, which was in her estimation a guerdon of blue blood.

Her elaborate and exclusive entertainments could never be rivalled by those of Mrs.
Wrapp.

She was a widow with one child, the daughter Elinor, a girl of nineteen.
Mrs.Maynard was tall, pale, and worldly.