Sampson overboard, her decision
might have been different.
"She is coming, my dear," Mrs. Staggchase had said to her husband, on
receiving Miss Merrivale's acceptance of her invitation. "I shouldn't
have expected it of one of your family."
"You know we can't all be born Beauchesters," he had returned, with
good-natured sarcasm.
Once at Mrs. Staggchase's, Miss Merrivale began to see Boston society
under very different auspices. She had been at a luncheon at Ethel
Mott's, given in compliment to herself, where she had sat nearly
speechless for an hour and a half while half a dozen young ladies had
discussed the origin of evil with great volubility, and what seemed to
her, however it might have impressed metaphysicians, astounding
erudition and profundity. She had assisted at that sacred rite of
musical devotees, the Saturday night Symphony concert, where a handful
of people gathered to hear the music, and all the rest of the world
crowded for the sake of having been there. She had been taken by Miss
Mott to a select sewing-circle--that peculiar institution by means of
which exclusive Boston society keeps tally of the standing of all its
young women. She was somewhat bewildered, but enjoyed what might be
called a hallowed consciousness that she was doing exactly the right
thing; and it was, perhaps, only a delicate consciousness of the
fitness of things that made her answer all questions as to the time of
her arrival in Boston with the date of her coming to Mrs.
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