It irritated Mrs.Whitney to look at him, as it had irritated her to look at Ellen; very painful were the reminders of the ravages of time from these people of about her own age, these whom she as a child had known as children.

Crow's-feet and breaking contour and thin hair in those we have known only as grown people, do not affect us; but the same signs in lifelong acquaintances make it impossible to ignore Decay holding up the mirror to us and pointing to aging mouth and throat, as he wags his hideous head and says, "Soon--_you_, too!" Hiram saw Matilda and his daughter the instant they appeared on the balcony, but he gave no hint of it until they were in the path of his monotonous march.

He was nerving himself for Mrs.Whitney as one nerves himself in a dentist's chair for the descent of the grinder upon a sensitive tooth.

Usually she got no further than her first sentence before irritating him.

To-day the very sight of her filled him with seemingly causeless anger.