Ivy with a superior
smile, "is a sense of responsibility toward her fellowmen. I have
already proposed her name for the Anti-Tobacco League and Miss Snell,
our corresponding secretary of the Foreign Missionary Society, has
promised to meet me here at five. It is these young, ardent souls that
must take up the banner of reform when it drops from the hands of us
veterans."
"Well," said Mrs. Sequin, turning a handsome, bored profile to her
companion, "I shall never get over the absurdity of the marriage!"
"Ah!" said Mrs. Ivy, laying a plump white hand on Mrs. Sequin's arm,
"cosmic forces brought them together! The thing we seek is seeking us.
She was young, inexperienced, adrift in the world; he was ill, lonely,
and with three motherless children. She told me that through the past
year, the Doctor's letters were all that sustained her."
"Of course they did! Cousin John's letters sustain everybody.
Especially if you haven't heard his lectures. Of course he does repeat
himself."
"As for her youth," went on Mrs. Ivy. "What if she is a mere rosebud
as yet? She'll unfold; we'll help her to unfold, you and I, won't we?"
Meanwhile the bride had slipped in the side entrance and was making
frantic haste in the room above to exchange a tennis costume for a new
house-dress.
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