Selma paid her respects by joining the family group for supper in the dining room on the Sunday evening of Lauretta’s arrival, but after that she went about her routine very much as she usually did. As the days passed, Sarah spent as much time as she could afford with her sister, and it was a good deal in dibs and dabs, but it was not enough to satisfy Lauretta. Sarah was forever bustling into Lauretta’s presence, but they seldom settled down to a really good quiet talk without Lovey’s, or someone else’s, interrupting to say that Sarah’s attention was required yonder, there, and everywhere but where she was. Always, Sarah apologized, begging forgiveness for these interruptions, and always she allowed them and went off to attend to whatever had been brought to her notice. She seemed to have little curiosity about Lauretta’s life upon the stage, whereas Lauretta had thought they would spend many hours together with Sarah envious and sighing as she, Lauretta, told her of her travels and experiences in and of the larger world.

“Oh, yes, tell me, please!” Sarah would implore and seem to mean it when Lauretta dropped an allusion to her other life; but soon enough Sarah would be up and away, begging Lauretta upon leaving her to be certain sure she remembered exactly where she had left off, so that they might pick up there at the earliest opportunity.

Aunt Pea wrote anxiously on being informed of Lauretta’s arrival and condition and intended sojourn at Beulah Land, but it seemed to Lauretta that she was easily reassured, writing very soon to Sarah that, “As much as I long to see and be with Lauretta, I think I should not travel in this heat unless I am really needed.”

Nell, “Aunt Nell,” as Lauretta promptly called her on their renewed acquaintance—was friendly, but she was far too self-absorbed to evidence true sympathy and interest. When Lauretta spoke with her on any but the most trivial concern, Nell’s eyes wandered to a cameo brooch pinned to her own breast. It was a likeness of General George Washington that had belonged to Deborah, and she studied it as though she had never seen it before, unpinning it to look upon it the more closely, and now and then making a remark or asking a question that really had nothing to do with whatever Lauretta was saying.