Toasted crumpets there were, and muffins, and a tea cake rich with
plums, and tea, I need not say, which was all that tea could be.
Several tables were filled with prominent ladies of the North Side
set, who were loud in their exclamations of delight, especially at the
finished smartness of my service, for it was perhaps now that the
profoundly serious thought I had given to my silver, linen, and
glassware showed to best advantage. I suspect that this was the first
time many of my guests had encountered a tea cozy, since from that day
they began to be prevalent in Red Gap homes. Also my wagon containing
the crumpets, muffins, tea cake, jam and bread-and-butter, which I now
used for the first time created a veritable sensation.
There was an agreeable hum of chatter from these early comers when I
found myself welcoming Mrs. Judge Ballard and half a dozen members of
the Onwards and Upwards Club, all of them wearing what I made out to
be a baffled look. From these I presently managed to gather that their
guest of honour for the afternoon had simply not appeared, and that
the meeting, after awaiting him for two hours, had dissolved in some
resentment, the time having been spent chiefly in an unflattering
dissection of the Klondike woman's behaviour the evening before.
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