CHAPTER II.
THE VAN BUREN SET Captain Markham's carryall, which Jake, the hired man, had brushed up wonderfully for the occasion, had gone over to West Chicopee after the party from Boston--Mrs.Dr.Van Buren, with Frank, and his betrothed, Miss Nettie Hudson, from Philadelphia.

Others had been invited from the city, but one after another their regrets had come to Ethelyn, who would gladly have excused the entire set, Aunt Van Buren, Frank and all, though she confessed to herself a great deal of curiosity with regard to Miss Nettie, whom she had never seen; neither had she met Frank since the dissolution of their engagement, for though she had been in Boston, where most of her dresses were made, Mrs.Dr.Van Buren had wisely arranged that Frank should be absent from home.

She was herself not willing to risk a meeting between him and Ethelyn until matters were too well adjusted to admit of a change, for Frank had more than once shown signs of rebellion.

He was in a more quiescent state now, having made up his mind that what could not be cured must be endured, and as he had sensibility enough to feel very keenly the awkwardness of meeting Ethelyn under present circumstances, and as Miss Nettie was really very fond of him, and he, after a fashion, was fond of her, he was in the best of spirits when he stepped from the train at West Chicopee and handed his mother and Nettie into the spacious carryall of which he had made fun as a country ark, while they rode slowly toward Aunt Barbara Bigelow's.

Everything was in readiness for them.