AT MISS DENTON'S DINNER TABLE
Seven o'clock dinner at Elberta Inn was a function in spite of the
dried apple pies. Miss Oleander Denton always insisted upon making of
it a real dinner party. It seemed as though, for the hour, she
attempted to forget that her guests were paying ones. To her black silk
gown she gave a festive air by turning it in at the neck, thereby
exposing her too prominent clavicles, but the effect was softened by a
beautiful old lace collar and a large cameo breastpin of rare
workmanship, depicting a lady in hoop skirts by a grave, over which
leant a weeping willow tree. Major Denton wore a rusty dress suit and a
carnation in his buttonhole. The boarders dressed or not as they chose,
but as a rule they played up to Miss Oleander's role of hostess and
appeared at dinner in festive raiment.
The table was set with care and taste, but Josie found the food no
better than the one meal she had eaten at Mrs. Pete's in Dorfield. Mrs.
Pete's cabbage and the accompanying corned beef had been excellent,
although the table had been covered with a red cloth, the crockery of
the thickest, unbreakable variety and a large toothpick holder the only
ornament. Miss Denton always had flowers on the table and her china was
what remained in the family after the administration of the hundred
slaves. It did not match but it was all good, some thin porcelain with
a gold band, some Canton whose blue made Josie homesick for the
Higgledy-Piggledy Shop and the little breakfast set, a gift from Mary
Louise.
The great difference between 126 East Centre and the Elberta Inn lay in
the type of boarders. A wider gulf existed between the clientele of the
two places than that between a red table cloth and a fine damask one,
or Canton china and Mrs. Pete's heavy stone crockery, or a vase of
roses and a toothpick holder.
Most of the boarders were permanent ones and while it was a rule of the
house to resent transients, they were secretly welcome because of the
added zest they gave to the humdrum of everyday life. The permanent
guests of Elberta Inn knew only too well all about each other and it
was a relief to have outsiders to pick on in spite of the ignominy of
having to sit down to meals with persons whose antecedents might be
doubtful. Elberta Inn was of the old South. The inroad of Western and
Northern capital had not touched the Maison Denton. To be sure the
transients who occasionally bore down upon them were often northerners
or westerners but they did not represent much capital or they would
have put up at a first-class hotel. This the boarders who called
Elberta Inn home year in and year out well understood and so it was all
transients were more or less looked down upon. They were not rich or
they would not be there and they were hardly well born, since they were
not born in the South. Of course they sympathized with Miss Oleander in
wanting to rent her rooms and the fact that a much higher board was
charged transients than permanents made transients somewhat desirable
if too long intervals did not elapse between their goings and comings.
All of the foregoing Josie gathered at her first dinner. She was
introduced with great eclat by her hostess. The party was seated as she
came into the dining room and down one side of the table and up the
other Miss Oleander called the names, each time repeating Josie as
"Miss Blossom, Colonel Brent; Miss Blossom, Miss Kite-Smith; Miss
Blossom, Mrs. Bucknow; Miss Blossom, Major Dugan; Miss Blossom, Mrs.
Claiborne; Miss Blossom, Judge Tuttle; Miss Blossom, my father, Major
Denton," and so forth and so on down a line of twenty.
Josie felt she had never been among so many titles in all her life. She
recalled some lines from an opera of Gilbert and Sullivan's:
"With admirals the ocean teemed
And bishops in their shovel hats
Were cheap as any tabby cats,
In point of fact too many."
"The women have no titles but their names sound so aristocratic," she
thought. "Why, oh, why did I choose such a silly name as Blossom? There
were plenty of nice plain names that would have done me just as well
and I wouldn't feel such a fool when I am introduced. I thought Miss
Oleander would never get through calling out Blossom."
She was relieved to find that her henna wig was not so very much out of
place. Miss Hite-Smith was blondined in the back, with a transformation
in the front that did not quite match and all of the aristocratic dames
had resorted to cosmetics of one kind or another. Powder predominated
but an occasional dash of rouge gave color to the party.
Dinner was in courses, served by two colored maids whose social strata
must have been about that of Betty's at Mrs. Pete's. To be sure they
had on white caps and aprons, garnishings of which Betty boasted not,
but their motions were reminiscent of the cornfield, as though they
might still be walking over ploughed ground.
Josie could not help thinking that perhaps the grandfather, he of the
hundreds of slaves and thousands of acres, would have turned over in
his grave again if he could have seen the type of repast served on his
beautiful old china. There was course after course but each was merely
a sample, from soup to coffee. Josie remembered the heaping plate of
cabbage and corned beef with the hunk of corn bread at Mrs. Pete's with
regretful sentiment.
"Blossom, Blossom! Did I hear aright, young lady?" asked Judge Tuttle.
"Is your name Blossom?"
"Yes, sir," said Josie, respectfully, but wishing in her heart the old
gentleman would not insist on that absurd name, "Sally Blossom!"
"Ah, and from what part of the country do you come?"
"Washington," answered Josie, thankful that at one time she had lived
there--was living there in fact when her father, Detective O'Gorman,
died. "I have been in Dorfield lately, though, on business."
"My grandmother's maiden name was Blossom," continued the judge, "and
strange to say, it was also Sally, or Sarah by the time she got to be
my grandmother. But she was a Virginian, a Virginian of tide-water
fame. What Blossom are you?"
"Just Blossom, sir; a blooming Blossom! My father was English," she
said in desperation. "At least I think he was. He died before he was
born--I mean I was born."
"Ah, very sad!" ventured the Judge and Miss Hite-Smith thought so too.
Josie, for her part, thought he was much better dead--that fictitious
Blossom. This questioning was more than she had bargained for. People
usually let her do the questioning. She rather fancied it was the
bobbed wig and the artificial complexion that made persons like the
judge notice her.
"That is a beautiful old house on the corner near here," she ventured.
"You mean the Haskins?" spoke up Miss Denton. "Yes, it is very
handsome, no doubt, but too ornate and pie-crusty for my--taste." Then
a discussion ensued concerning architecture, old and new.
"I mean the house going East from this place," put in Josie, not at all
interested in the Haskins house. "The old home with the ivy and the
box-bushes in the yard."
"Oh, the Waller house!" said Major Denton. "That is perhaps the finest
specimen of the old South left in the city. It was saved from the
Yankee invasion by a piece of luck."
He then plunged into war reminiscences that lasted through three
courses, his table companions listening with bored politeness.
"Do the same people still live there?" asked Josie, after Major Denton
had fired the last shot for states' rights.
"Well, they do and they don't," began the Major.
"I can't see why you say they do," broke in Judge Tuttle. "Chester Hunt
hasn't an ounce of Waller blood in his veins."
"Indeed he has," declared Mrs. Claiborne. "Chester Hunt's mother's
great-grandmother was a niece of old Edmund Waller's, the English
founder of the Waller family. That is a well-known fact."
"Ah, yes, a niece but--ah, well--the presence of ladies would deter my
pressing my point," said Judge Tuttle, who then whispered sibilantly to
a pink-cheeked old man across the table.
"As I was saying," continued Major Denton, "they do and they don't. The
present occupant of the Waller mansion is a stepbrother of Stephen
Waller's. He, poor fellow, was killed during the war, the world war, I
mean, not the war between the states."
"Yes," breathed Josie, "and the stepbrother inherited his property?"
"Oh, no, there is a widow and two children. A very sad story, very sad!
The widow has been crazed by grief and I hear is hopelessly insane. The
two children have been placed in care of an excellent woman and are now
living near their mother, so if she should ever ask for them they can
be reached quickly. She has shown no sign as yet of wanting to see
them. A sad case!"
"Yes, and I wouldn't trust those sanitariums," spoke Miss Oleander.
"They are often very tricky."
"Neither would I," said a young woman across the table from Josie. Her
name was Miss Chisholm and she had the distinction of being in
business. The ladies at Miss Denton's were not the type to be in
business.
"But Chester Hunt has been to the place again and again and says his
step-sister-in-law is receiving every attention and is being watched
with the greatest care. She is raving, so he says, and he is very sad
over it. Chester Hunt is a fine young fellow in spite of the unkind
things some persons say about his great-great-grandmother," declared
Mrs. Claiborne, vindictively.
"I don't like him," asserted Miss Chisholm.
"Indeed!" and Mrs. Claiborne eyed Miss Chisholm through her lorgnette.
"He is very popular with young ladies." There was a slight accent on
the ladies.
"Popular enough with girls who see him in society but you ask
stenographers how they like him," flushed Miss Chisholm.
"I am hardly likely to converse with stenographers on the subject of
Mr. Hunt," was the insolent answer.
Josie determined to cultivate Miss Chisholm and to give Mrs. Claiborne
a wide berth.
"Where has the poor lady been put?" Josie asked Miss Oleander,
"Somewhere in New York, I think!"
"Not at all! The place is an excellent one near Washington," said Mrs.
Claiborne.
"Hunt told me himself it was in Indiana," said Judge Tuttle. "I had
some business to settle for him. You see he is the executor and
administrator of Stephen Waller's estate. Naturally he was appointed
guardian of the children by the court.
"I understand they are a very unruly pair," went on Mrs. Claiborne. "It
seems it was their selfishness and naughtiness that gave their poor
mother her final breakdown. I hate to think it of Stephen Waller's
children, but I hear it on all sides. Chester Hunt can hardly control
himself when the subject comes up. He has done everything for them but
they have behaved so very badly. Mother spoiled them, I reckon."
"Why, that's too bad," put in kind Miss Oleander. "I used to see them
playing in their yard and I was much attracted by them. I don't see how
such sweet-looking children could be so very naughty."
"Nonsense!" cried Miss Chisholm. "My cousin taught little Polly Waller
and she says she was the most tractable child she has ever had in her
class. The boy was too young for school, but I happened to hear his
kindergarten teacher discussing the family with my cousin and she said
Peter was a love of a boy and clever beyond anything. He is a born
leader, so she said."
"They are sneaky," asserted Mrs. Claiborne. "I have heard of many
sneaky underhand things they have done. Poor Chester Hunt, I don't envy
him the job of guardian."
"Neither do I," said Josie to herself.
"He has had a great deal of trouble with servants lately," said Miss
Hite-Smith. "I hear he is not trying to keep up the whole house but it
takes several servants to maintain any kind of cleanliness in such a
huge house. He is advertising for white maids, so I hear. It seems the
colored ones think the place is haunted."
"He is advertising for white maids!" Josie repeated to herself.