AT THE BEECHES The invitation came by telephone while the family was at breakfast next morning.

Would the house-party at The Locusts join the house-party at The Beeches in giving a series of tableaux at their lawn fete that night?
If so, would the house-party at The Locusts proceed immediately to The Beeches to spend the morning in the rehearsing of tableaux, the selection of costumes, the manufacture of paper roses, and the pleasure of each other's honorable company in the partaking of a picnic-lunch under the trees?
There was an enthusiastic acceptance from all except Eugenia, who, tired from her long journey and with many important things to attend to, begged to be left behind for a quiet day with her cousin Elizabeth.
Mary, tormented by a fear that maybe she was not included in the invitation, since she was a child, and all the guests at The Beeches were grown, could scarcely finish her breakfast in her excitement.

But long before the girls were ready to start, her fears were set at rest by the arrival of Elise Walton in her pony-cart.

She wanted Mary to drive to one of the neighbors with her, to borrow a bonnet and shawl over fifty years old, which were to figure in one of the tableaux.
Elise had not been attracted by Mary's appearance the day she met her in the restaurant and was not sure that she would care for her.

It was only her hospitable desire to be nice to a guest in the Valley that made her comply so willingly to her mother's request to show her some especial attention.