of the Fleur-de-Lis Club who had entertained the last time, Mrs. Adams served simple but well-prepared “collations,” as they were called. The sensing that they were more attractive for their very simplicity did not serve to sweeten the tempers of those who depended on elaborateness. This same simplicity governed all Mrs. Adams’ actions whether in social or other relations. It had brought to her the damning reputation of being “stuck-up” and there is none other accusation more certain to gain a measured unpopularity. This reputation, though unfounded in fact as in the case of her mother, had been attached to Hilda and, in turn, to her friend, Mimi.
To about the same degree Mimi’s lack of religious conformity militated against her. She felt a certain bitterness against the Catholic Church for its surrender to a race prejudice which to her seemed silly, but her animosity towards that Church was based most largely on the fact that the surrender had hurt Jean. With the fortunate tendency of youth not to bother itself too greatly about creeds and dogmas, Mimi might quickly have forgotten or at least put into the limbo of half-forgotten things most of the religious duties which to her in New Orleans had seemed so natural—as natural as eating or sleeping. Though Jean rarely mentioned it now, Mimi knew he grieved deeply that he could not attend mass—that down deep beneath the calm exterior he presented to the world and even to his family, Jean felt the loss keenly of church attendance. And when Mimi saw this hurt, it caused her frequently to speak of the differences she noticed between Catholic and Protestant devotees. Usually these were, quite naturally, more critical of the Protestant, and this constant reiteration of her own unconformity to local creeds and beliefs in time caused the phrase “those Catholics” to be instinctively synonymous with her name and Jean’s. …
But it was the instinctive cruelty towards and jealousy of woman to woman which created difficulties for Mimi. Something of the colourfulness of the sapphire and purple and jade green waters round