What I really did get off was something like this: "Good Jones, Mrs.Evening.I should say, good-evening, widows--ladies, I beg your pardon," by which time I was mopping my forehead with my handkerchief, and could just ask, as I sank into the first chair I saw, "Is your mother well, Mrs.Jones ?" which was highly opportune, since said mother had been years dead before I was born.

As I sat down, a pang sharper than some of those endured by the Spartans ran through my right leg.

I was instantly aware that I had plumped down on a needle, as well as a piece of fancy-work, but I had not the courage to rise and extract the excruciating thing.
I turned pale with pain, but by keeping absolutely still I found that I could endure it, and so I sat motionless, like a wooden man, with a frozen smile on my features.
Belle was out in the other room helping set the table, for which mitigating circumstances I was sufficiently thankful.
Fred Hencoop was on the other side of the room holding a skein of silk for Sallie Brown.

He looked across at me, smiling with a malice which made me hate him.
Out of that hate was born a stern resolve--I would conquer my diffidence; I would prove to Fred Hencoop, and any other fellow like him, that I was as good as he was, and could at least equal him in the attractions of my sex.
There was a pretty girl sitting quite near me.

I had been introduced to her at the picnic.