Before Mr.and Mrs.Ogden left for Europe, Sally had talked to her sister Cornelia ...

long and weightily, on the problem of Dale." "Problem of Dale, indeed!" thought Miss Cornelia scornfully.

"Dale's the nicest thing I've seen in some time.
She'd be ten times happier if Sally wasn't always trying to marry her off to some young snip with more of what fools call 'eligibility' than brains! But there, Cornelia Van Gorder--Sally's given you your innings by rampaging off to Europe and leaving Dale with you all summer and you've a lot less sense than I flatter myself you have, if you can't give your favorite niece a happy vacation from all her immediate family--and maybe find her someone who'll make her happy for good and all in the bargain." Miss Cornelia was an incorrigible matchmaker.
Nevertheless, she was more concerned with "the problem of Dale" than she would have admitted.

Dale, at her age, with her charm and beauty--why, she ought to behave as if she were walking on air, thought her aunt worriedly.

"And instead she acts more as if she were walking on pins and needles.