Mrs. Arty led her chattering flock to the basement dining-room,
which had pink wall-paper and a mountainous sideboard. Mr.
Wrenn was placed between Mrs. Arty and Nelly Croubel. Out of
the mist of strangeness presently emerged the personality of
Miss Mary Proudfoot, a lively but religious spinster of forty
who made doilies for the Dorcas Women's Exchange and had two
hundred dollars a year family income. To the right of the
red-glass pickle-dish were the elderly Ebbitts--Samuel Ebbitt,
Esq., also Mrs. Ebbitt. Mr. Ebbitt had come from Hartford five
years before, but he always seemed just to have come from there.
He was in a real-estate office; he was gray, ill-tempered,
impatiently honest, and addicted to rheumatism and the
newspapers. Mrs. Ebbitt was addicted only to Mr. Ebbitt.
Across the table was felt the presence of James T. Duncan, who
looked like a dignified red-mustached Sunday-school
superintendent, but who traveled for a cloak and suit house,
gambled heavily on poker and auction pinochle, and was esteemed
for his straight back and knowledge of trains.
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