Guy was exceedingly particular, and developed a wonderful proclivity to
find fault with everything I admired. Nothing was quite the thing for
Daisy until at last a manufacturer offered to get one up which should
suit, and so the carpet question was happily ended for the time being.
Then came the furniture, and unlimited orders were given to the
upholsterer to do his best, and matters were progressing finely when
order number two came from the little lady, who was sorry to seem so
fickle, but mamma, whose taste was perfect, had decided against all
blue, and would Guy please furnish the room with drab trimmed with blue.
"It must be a very delicate shade of drab," she wrote, and lest he
should get too intense an idea, she would call it a _tint_ of a _shade_
of drab, or, better yet, a _hint_ of a tint of a shade of drab would
describe exactly what she meant, and be so entirely unique, and lovely,
and recherché.
Guy never swears, and seldom uses slang of any kind, but this was a
little too much, and with a most rueful expression of countenance he
asked me "what in thunder I supposed a hint of a tint of a shade of drab
could be."
I could not enlighten him, and we finally concluded to leave it to the
upholsterer, to whom Guy telegraphed in hot haste, bidding him hunt New
York over for the desired shade. Where he found it I never knew, but
find it he did, or something approximating to it, a faded, washed-out
color, which seemed a cross between wood-ashes and pale skim milk. A
sample was sent up for Guy's approval, and then the work commenced
again, when order number three came in one of those dainty little
billets which used to make Guy's face radiant with happiness. Daisy had
changed her mind again and gone back to the blue, which she always
preferred as most becoming to her complexion.
Guy did not say a single word, but he took the next train for New York
and stayed there till the furniture was done and packed for Cuylerville.
As I did not know where he was stopping, I could not forward him two
little missives which came during his absence, and which bore the
Indianapolis post-mark. I suspect he had a design in keeping his hotel
from me, and whether Daisy changed her mind again or not I never knew.
The furniture reached Elmwood the day but one before Guy started for his
bride, and Julia Hamilton, who was then at the Towers, helped me arrange
the room, which is a perfect little gem and cannot fail to please, I am
sure. I wonder Guy never fancied Julia Hamilton. Oh, if he only had done
so I should not have as many misgivings as I now have nor dread the
future so much. Julia is sensible and twenty years old, and lives in
Boston, and comes of a good family, and is every way suitable; but when
did a man ever choose the woman whom his sister thought suitable for
him? And Guy is like other men, and this is his wedding day; and after a
trip to Montreal, and Quebec, and Boston, and New York, and Saratoga,
they are coming home, and I am to give a grand reception and then
subside, I suppose, into the position of the "old maid sister who will
be dreadfully in the way."