No documents survive to indicate just when and how Frost met his bride-to-be, but some of the events can be surmised. Susan Noland Haxall had left her home in Middleburg, Virginia, at about age twenty-two and was living in an apartment in Washington. Middleburg is located in Fauquier County about fifteen miles northeast of Marshall—not far today, but a long enough buggy ride at the end of the nineteenth century, so that Frost and Susan Haxall had not met. The Haxall family home, named Exning for the English town in which the Haxalls had their genealogical roots, was located on the main road through Middleburg (now US Route 50, the John Mosby Highway) to the east of the town. Set back from the road at the end of a tree-shaded drive and graced with a large veranda, it stands today largely unchanged from the time that the Haxall’s owned it. Figure 6.1 shows Exning as it is today.

Susan Haxall operated a dancing school in Washington, known as “Miss Haxall’s Dancing Classes,” teaching not only ballroom dancing but also appropriate manners and etiquette to young members of socially prominent families in the nations’s capital. She was a competent business woman, and supported herself for seventeen years in this manner. She had many relatives in Washington, and with them and their friends had an active social life.

Frost enjoyed dancing, which he had learned while a student at Danville Military Institute, but he did not meet Susan in that context, since her school was for children. They may, of course, have had enjoyable moments on the dance floor at one or another social function. They shared some common acquaintances, and most certainly met through one of them. Dr. Bolling M. Barton was a distant relative of the Haxalls. A widower, he lived with Susan’s family at Exning for many of Susan’s childhood years and was very close to the Haxall family. He was commonly called “Uncle” by Susan and her siblings, and upon his death was buried in a Haxall plot in the Sharon Cemetery in Middleburg.