"
After a little silence Mrs. Wetmore asked, "Won't you come home with us,
Mr. Beaton?"
"Thank you; no. I have an engagement."
"I don't see why that should prevent you," said Wetmore. "But you always
were a punctilious cuss. Well!"
Beaton lingered over his cigar; but no one else whom he knew came in, and
he yielded to the threefold impulse of conscience, of curiosity, of
inclination, in going to call at the Leightons'. He asked for the ladies,
and the maid showed him into the parlor, where he found Mrs. Leighton and
Miss Woodburn.
The widow met him with a welcome neatly marked by resentment; she meant
him to feel that his not coming sooner had been noticed. Miss Woodburn
bubbled and gurgled on, and did what she could to mitigate his
punishment, but she did not feel authorized to stay it, till Mrs.
Leighton, by studied avoidance of her daughter's name, obliged Beaton to
ask for her. Then Miss Woodburn caught up her work, and said, "Ah'll go
and tell her, Mrs. Leighton." At the top of the stairs she found Alma,
and Alma tried to make it seem as if she had not been standing there.
"Mah goodness, chald! there's the handsomest young man asking for you
down there you evah saw. Alh told you' mothah Ah would come up fo' you.
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