aborateness of the dress, the chiffon skirts poised one upon another,
which softened the glare of the satin slip, the exquisite design of the
embroidery, the rare and varied beads with which it was intermingled.

"Grizel--what gorgeousness! Every bead is a treasure. It must have
taken months to work. And on a piece of perishable net. I have _read_
about such things, but I've never seen them... Mrs Brewston would read
you a lesson on wanton extravagance--"

"_Decadence_," interrupted Grizel firmly. "You must _always_ call it
decadence. And I should perfectly agree. But the poor lambs had
embroidered it, so some one _had_ to pay, and Aunt Griselda might as
well do it as any one else. I wouldn't have dreamed of _giving_ the
order!"

"Humbug! Quibbler!--Is there any possible way of getting into it, or do
you wriggle in at the neck? There's nothing of you, my dear, but you
are modelled so considerately--plump in the right places! ... The
sleeves are a trifle attenuated, don't you think?"

"Perhaps they are, but it's the fault of my arms. They _are_ so pretty!
Look at that ikkle, ikkle dimple... You wouldn't have the heart to
hide it!" returned Grizel, shutting one eye so as to peer with the other
at the soft, infantile dents above the elbow. In praise or blame she
was always markedly honest as regarded her own appearance. Even when
Martin made his appearance at the door, and came to the sudden stand as
if dazzled by the glittering apparition in the middle of the dark room,
Grizel seemed to see no reason for changing her pose, but continued to
peer and to crane with undiminished interest.

"I'm showing Katrine a bonnie wee dimple... This side, to the west! I
can just peer at it like this, but it's beautiful viewed from the side,
I wear my sleeve cut short `a pupos.' ... This is the dress that the
Duck wears, Martin, the night she's engaged. He hadn't intended to
speak so soon, but when he saw her in it he couldn't resist--"

"I'm sure he couldn't--!"

Martin's echo came back with what his sister considered a painful
banality. She flinched before it, as at a desecration. When one is
accustomed to regard a man as seated on a permanent pinnacle of grief,
it is a shock to find him condescending to the ordinary barter of
compliment, but Martin was oblivious of her frown, for Grizel had opened
her closed eye, and peered upward into his face with her sweet, lazy
smile.

He gave her his arm, led her in