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Miss Webster sat on a high-backed chair by the table, nervously striving to entertain her fashionable guests. The women huddled together to keep warm, regardless of their expensive raiment. The men stood in a corner, reviling the mid-day dinner in prospect. Miss Williams drifted into a chair and gazed dully on the accustomed scene. She had looked on it weekly, with barely an intermission, for a quarter of a century. With a sensation of relief, so sharp that it seemed to underscore the hateful monotony of it all, she observed that there was a young person in the company. As a rule, neither threats nor bribes could bring the young to Webster Hall. Then she felt glad that the young person was a man. She was in no mood to look on the blooming hopeful face of a girl.

He was a fine young fellow, with the supple lean figure of the college athlete, and a frank attractive face. He stood with his hands plunged into his pockets, gazing on the scene with an expression of ludicrous dismay. In a moment he caught the companion’s eye. She smiled involuntarily, all that was still young in her leaping to meet that glad symbol of youth. He walked quickly over to her.

“I say,” he exclaimed, apologetically, “I haven’t been introduced, but do let ceremony go, and talk to me. I never saw so many old fogies in my life, and this room is like a morgue. I almost feel afraid to look behind me.”

She gave him a grateful heart-beat for all that his words implied.

“Sit down,” she said, with a vivacity she had not known was left in her sluggish currents. “How–did–you–come–here?”

“Why, you see, I’m visiting the Holts–Jack Holt was my chum at college–and when they asked me if I wanted to see the oldest house in the city, and meet the most famous man ‘on this side of the bay,’ why, of course, I said I’d come. But, gods! I didn’t know it would be like this, although Jack said the tail of a wild mustang couldn’t get him through the front door. Being on my first visit to the widely renowned California, I thought it my duty to see all the sights. Where did you come from?”

“Oh, I live here. I’ve lived here for twenty-four years.”

“Great Scott!” His eyes bulged. “You’ve lived in this house for twenty-four years?”

“Twenty-four years.”

“And you’re not dead yet–I beg pardon,” hastily. “I am afraid you think me very rude.”

“No, I do not. I am glad you realize how dreadful it is. Nobody else ever does. These people have known me for most of that time, and it has never occurred to them to wonder how I stood it. Do you know that you are the first young person I have spoken with for years and years?”

“You don’t mean it?” His boyish soul was filled with pity. “Well, I should think you’d bolt and run.”

“What use? I’ve stayed too long. I’m an old woman now, and may as well stay till the end.”

The youth was beginning to feel embarrassed, but was spared the effort of making a suitable reply by the entrance of Dr. Webster. The old man was clad in shining broadcloth, whose maker was probably dead these many years. He leaned on a cane heavily mounted with gold.

“Howdy, howdy, howdy?” he cried, in his rough but hospitable tones. “Glad to see you. Didn’t think you’d come. Yes, I did, though,” with a chuckle. “Well, come down to dinner, I’m hungry.”

He turned his back without individual greeting, and led the way along the hall, then down a narrow creaking stairway to the basement dining-room, an apartment as stark and cheerless as the parlor, albeit the silver on the table was very old and heavy, the linen unsurpassed.

The guests seated themselves as they listed, the youngster almost clinging to Miss Williams. The doctor hurriedly ladled the soup, announcing that he had a notion to let them help themselves, he was so hungry. When he had given them this brief attention he supplied his own needs with the ladle direct from the tureen.