maid. I don't know as she's got anything fit to wear to that dinner,"
Mrs. Spragg added in a tentative murmur.

Mr. Spragg smiled at last. "Well--I guess she WILL have," he said
prophetically.

He glanced again at his daughter's door, as if to make sure of its being
shut; then, standing close before his wife, he lowered his voice to say:
"I saw Elmer Moffatt down town to-day."

"Oh, Abner!" A wave of almost physical apprehension passed over Mrs.
Spragg. Her jewelled hands trembled in her black brocade lap, and the
pulpy curves of her face collapsed as if it were a pricked balloon.

"Oh, Abner," she moaned again, her eyes also on her daughter's door. Mr.
Spragg's black eyebrows gathered in an angry frown, but it was evident
that his anger was not against his wife.

"What's the good of Oh Abner-ing? Elmer Moffatt's nothing to us--no
more'n if we never laid eyes on him."

"No--I know it; but what's he doing here? Did you speak to him?" she
faltered.

He slipped his thumbs into his waistcoat pockets. "No--I guess Elmer and
I are pretty well talked out."

Mrs. Spragg took up her moan. "Don't you tell her you saw him, Abner."

"I'll do as you say; but she may meet him herself."