The Brimming Cup

An Hour in the Home Life of Mrs. Neale Crittenden, aet. 34 March 20.

As she and Paul carried the table out to the windless, sunny side-porch,

Marise was struck by a hospitable inspiration. "You and Elly go on

setting the table," she told the children, and ran across the side-yard

to the hedge. She leaned over this, calling, "Mr. Welles! Mr. Welles!"

and when he came to the door, "The children and I are just celebrating

this first really warm day by having lunch out of doors. Won't you and

Mr. Marsh come and join us?"

By the time the explanations and protestations and renewals of the

invitation were over and she brought them back to the porch, Paul and

Elly had almost finished setting the table. Elly nodded a

country-child's silent greeting to the newcomers. Paul said, "Oh goody!

Mr. Welles, you sit by me."

Marise was pleased at the friendship growing up between the gentle old

man and her little boy.

"Elly, don't you want me to sit by you?" asked Marsh with a playful

accent.

Elly looked down at the plate she was setting on the table. "If you want

to," she said neutrally.

Her mother smiled inwardly. How amusingly Elly had acquired as only a

child could acquire an accent, the exact astringent, controlled brevity

of the mountain idiom.

"I think Elly means that she would like it very much, Mr. Marsh," she

said laughingly. "You'll soon learn to translate Vermontese into

ordinary talk, if you stay on here."

She herself went through the house into the kitchen and began placing

on the wheel-tray all the components of the lunch, telling them over to

herself to be sure she missed none. "Meat, macaroni, spinach, hot

plates, bread, butter, water . . . a pretty plain meal to invite city

people to share. Here, I'll open a bottle of olives. Paul, help me get

this through the door."

As he pulled at the other end of the wheeled tray, Paul said that Mark

had gone upstairs to wash his hands, ages ago, and was probably still

fooling around in the soap-suds, and like as not leaving the soap in the

water.

"Paul the responsible!" thought his mother. As they passed the foot of

the stairs she called up, "Mark! Come along, dear. Lunch is served. All

ready," she announced as they pushed the tray out on the porch.

The two men turned around from where they had been gazing up at the

mountain. "What is that great cliff of bare rock called?" asked Mr.

Marsh.