It was a
delightful relation.
"Grandmamma has taken a fancy to you, I can see," she told Katy, as they
drove back to Longwood. "She always wants to know my friends; and she
has her own opinions about them, I can tell you."
"Do you really think she liked me?" said Katy, warmly. "I am so glad
if she did, for I _loved_ her. I never saw a really beautiful old
person before."
"Oh, there's nobody like her," rejoined Rose. "I can't imagine what it
would be not to have her." Her merry little face was quite sad and
serious as she spoke. "I wish she were not so old," she added with a
sigh. "If we could only put her back twenty years! Then, perhaps, she
would live as long as I do."
But, alas! there is no putting back the hands on the dial of time, no
matter how much we may desire it.
The second day of Katy's visit was devoted to the luncheon-party of
which Rose had written in her letter, and which was meant to be a
reunion or "side chapter" of the S.S.U.C. Rose had asked every old
Hillsover girl who was within reach. There was Mary Silver, of course,
and Esther Dearborn, both of whom lived in Boston; and by good luck
Alice Gibbons happened to be making Esther a visit, and Ellen Gray came
in from Waltham, where her father had recently been settled over a
parish, so that all together they made six of the original nine of the
society; and Quaker Row itself never heard a merrier confusion of
tongues than resounded through Rose's pretty parlor for the first hour
after the arrival of the guests.
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