Page:Wilson - The Boss of Little Arcady (1905).djvu/236

 ciations. Sometime she had read a tale in which one Howard Melville had gone to the great city and wrecked a career of much promise by accepting a glass of something from the hands of a beautiful but thoughtless girl, pampered child of the banker with whom he had secured a position. For a dread moment Marcella seemed to recall that the fatal draught was named "punch." But after a tentative sip of the compound at hand, she decided that it must have been something else—doubtless "a glass of sparkling wine." For this punch before her was palpably of a babe's innocence. Indeed it tasted rather like an inferior lemonade. But it was cold, and Marcella tossed off a second cup of it. She could make better lemonade herself, and she murmured slightingly of the stuff to Aunt Delia McCormick.

"It wants more lemons and more sugar," said Marcella, firmly. Aunt Delia pressed back the white satin bow on her bosom in order to manage her second glass with entire safety.

"I don't know, Marcella," she said in a dreamy undertone, after draining the cup to its cherry. "I don't know—it does seem to take hold, for all it tastes so trifling."

As each lady arrived she was led to the punch-bowl. When the last one had been taught the way to that cool nook, there was a pleasant hum of voices in the room. There was still an undercurrent of difference as to the punch's merit—other than mere