At fifteen Annabel was just at a time she might presume to include herself with the adult party, so long as she showed modesty and deference, which she did almost to ostentation; whereas Adam, although sixteen, was still considered a boy and expected to enjoy the company of the younger group in the office. This he was perfectly happy to do, for there he could claim Rachel.

Roman had not been wrong that day of the children’s picnic in the grove. Adam had started to love Rachel then, and his love had been steady. For Rachel, Leon had been, was still, the romantic father. Roman was the trusted brother. Even as a child she understood that, although they loved her, she was not the center and mainstay of their lives. But when she was with Adam, she had the exhilarating sense of being exactly the peak of his consciousness. The fact that he was so much older than she—so it seemed to her then—did not matter. Her assurance of his feeling made her proud of herself and a little arrogant with life.

Without anyone’s having noticed her descent, such was the traffic on the stairs, Selma was there, sitting in the office by the desk, part of the children’s party, in a black gown to be sure, but wearing a double-looped necklace of amethysts that kept her from looking mournful, and a wreath of cloth violets as a crown for her hair. Presently, without anyone’s having seen it happen, Pauline was seated beside Selma as if attending her—and no one questioned attendance, even though the Negro woman was not dressed as a servant and did not behave as a servant would have. She sat quietly beside Selma, hands in lap. She answered agreeably those who spoke to her and kept her peace when she was let alone. She was accepted as a member of the party without anyone’s deciding what her place or function of the evening was. Because of her eccentricity, Selma was considered by outsiders to be something like a child, and a Negro woman’s presence anywhere was acceptable where there was a child to be seen to. As the evening progressed and the occasional gentleman approached Selma to ask her hand in the dancing, she explained that she was in mourning. For the most part she and her companion kept solemn faces, but now and then, inexplicably to those who observed them, they would burst into a fit of giggling and put their heads together and whisper.