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The wooden shutters of the small parlor were still drawn, making the small square room brown and dusky. I had an impression of the whatnot in the corner with the sea shells on it, of the braided rug on the green pine floor, of my great-grandfather's portrait, and of my great-grandmother's portrait over the coal grate, and of the Hogarth print which someone had found in the attic, and of the water color of the river which Cousin Clothilde's mother had done after she came back from Brook Farm, and of the broken Chippendale chair, and of the whole one. I was aware of all these things without really seeing them, just as I was sometimes aware of their presence in the dark. Bella was picking the telephone off the little table and was slouching down into the nearest Windsor chair.

"Hello," Bella was saying, "hello."

Her voice was no longer careless—it had a modulated allure; it gave a gay and provocative invitation; it told of a girl who was expecting something nice and was ready to try anything once. It was the voice which had taken away at least two of her sister Mary's boy friends.