Alden's Idea of a Trunk
With the tact that seems the birthright of the gifted few, Mrs. Lee adjusted herself to the ways of the Marsh household. Some commotion had been caused by the arrival of four more trunks, of different shapes and sizes, but after they had been unpacked and stored, things went on smoothly.
Alden's idea of a trunk had hitherto been very simple. To him, it was only a substantial box, variation in size and in exterior finish being the only possible diversions from the original type. When it fell to his lot, on a Saturday morning, to superintend the removal of Mrs. Lee's empty trunks to the attic, he discovered the existence of hat trunks, dresser trunks, and wardrobe trunks, cannily constructed with huge warts on all sides but the one the trunk was meant to stand upon.
"Why so scornful?" a sweet voice asked, at his elbow.
"I'm not scornful," he returned. "I'm merely interested."
In the Hall
"You're fortunate," she smiled, "to be so easily interested."
"We're out of the world here, you know, and unfamiliar varieties of the trunk species make me feel much as Crusoe did when he came upon a human footprint in the sand."
"I wonder," mused Mrs. Lee, "how he really did feel. It must have been dramatic beyond all words."
She sat down on the window-seat in the hall and leaned back against the casement of the open window. The warm Spring wind, laden with the sweet scent of growing things, played caressingly about her neck and carried to Alden a subtle fragrance of another sort. Her turquoise-blue silk kimono, delicately embroidered in gold, was open at the throat and fastened at the waist with a heavy golden cord. Below, it opened over a white petticoat that was a mass of filmy lace ruffles. Her tiny feet peeped out beneath the lace, clad in pale blue silk stockings and fascinating Chinese slippers that turned up at the toes.
From above came discordant rumblings and eloquent, but smothered remarks on the general subject of trunks. Mrs. Lee laughed. "They're trying to make the wardrobe-trunk stand up on the wrong end, and it won't."
"How do you know that's it?"
"Because I've heard the same noises and the same general trend of conversation all the way from the Atlantic to the Pacific and back again. The farther west you go, the more accomplished the men are in the art of profanity."
Sounds from the Attic
"Is it an art? I thought it came naturally."