She liked these people, and Richard found no trouble in getting her to return their calls.

She would gladly have stayed in Camden altogether, and once laughingly pointed out to Richard a large, vacant lot, adjoining Mr.Fenton's, where she would like to have her new house built.
There was a decided improvement in Ethelyn; nor did her old perversity of temper manifest itself very strongly until one morning, three weeks after her arrival in Olney, when Richard suggested to her the propriety of his mother's giving them a party, or infair, as he called it.

The people expected it, he said; they would be disappointed without it, and, indeed, he felt it was something he owed them for all their kindness to him.

Then Ethelyn rebelled--stoutly, stubbornly rebelled--but Richard carried the point, and two days after the farmhouse was in a state of dire confusion, wholly unlike the quiet which reigned there usually.
Melinda Jones was there all the time, while Mrs.Jones was back and forth, and a few of the Olney ladies dropped in with suggestions and offers of assistance.

It was to be a grand affair--so far, at least, as numbers were concerned--for everybody was invited, from Mr.Townsend and the other clergy, down to Cecy Doane, who did dressmaking and tailoring from house to house.