“I’m going to see about the spare room right off so that it will be all in order if any one comes early,” said Pat briskly. “May I have that new hooked rug you’ve got stored away in the attic to lay by the bed…the one with the great soft, plushy roses?”

“Av coorse. I mint it for yer hope chist but the way ye’re snubbing the min right and lift there’ll be lashings av time for that. Put plinty av blankets on the bed, Patsy darlint. If the Bay Shore aunts come they may be staying all night. Style widout comfort is not the way av Silver Bush. Yer Aunt Helen at Glenwood now…ye do be knowing yersilf what style she puts on…silk spreads and liddle lace and ribbing cushions…but I’ve always been hearing that people who slipt there vowed they were cold in bed. The minister slipt there one night and so cold he was he started prowling for a blanket in the night and fell down the back stairs. That was be way av being a disgrace. I’m telling ye.”

Cuddles had already made the spare room bed and was infuriated because Pat insisted on making it over again.

“You’ll be as bad as Aunt Edith before you’re thirty, Pat. She imagines nobody can do anything right but herself. And Judy’s no better, no matter what she thinks. She’s been teaching me to make gravy for weeks but now when I want to make it today she won’t let me. You all make me weary.”

“Don’t be cross, Cuddles. You made the bed as nicely as anyone could but the extra blankets have to be put on. Cuddles, do you know I love to make up beds and think of all the tired people who will lie in them. I couldn’t bear it if anyone should be cold in bed in Silver Bush. Will you get some of the silver polish and do the mirrors? I want them to shine like diamonds…especially the one in the hall.”

The hall mirror was one that had been brought out from France by Great-great-grandmother, Marie Bonnet. It was a long, softly gleaming thing in a ruddy copper frame and Pat loved it. Cuddles had an affection for it, too, because she thought she looked nicer in it than in any other mirror at Silver Bush.

“Sure and it was always the flattering one,” said Judy, as Cuddles rubbed at the frame. “Minny’s the pretty face that’s looked into it.”

“I wonder,” said Pat dreamily…passing carelessly through the hall just to make sure Cuddles was doing the polishing right…“if one came here some moonlit night one couldn’t see all the shadowy faces that once looked into it looking out again.”