ed
at the suggestion and looked as pleased as Punch. I suppose he doesn't
want me to be a fright and disgrace his car on the journey.

When Miss Hubbell had come in from the next house, smelling of some
lovely sort of jam which she and her mother had been making, off we
three went in the gray automobile, Mrs. James trying not to look
self-conscious and proud, nor to give little jumps and gasps when she
thought we were going to run over creatures.

It is many years since she has been to London. I think she was there on
her wedding trip and never since: and besides that expedition, Exeter
and Carlisle are her two largest cities: but, in order to impress the
great artist, she patronized Carlisle, saying we "mustn't hope for
London shops." I longed to catch his eye, because I'm sure he sees
everything that is funny; but it would have been horrid to laugh at the
kind darling, trying to be a woman of the world.

In the end, it was Mr. Somerled and I who chose everything, even Mrs.
James's motor coat and hat, for she was too timid to decide; and if she
had decided, it would have been to select all the wrong things. I had to
get my dresses ready-made, because of starting for Scotland next
morning, and it was funny to see how difficult Mr. Somerled was to
please. One would have thought he took a real interest in my clothes;
but of course it was owing to his artistic nature. We found a blue
serge--I wouldn't have believed, after my deadly experience, that blue
serge could be so pretty--and a coat and skirt of creamy cloth; and an
evening frock of white chiffon, I think the girl called it. Actually it
has short sleeves above my elbows, and quite a low neck, that shows
where my collar-bone used to be when I was thinner than I am now. It
seems an epoch to have a dress like that. It was Mr. Somerled who picked
it out from among others, and insisted on my having it, though, simple
as it looked, it was terribly expensive. Mrs. James thought I couldn't
afford it, as I had so many things to do with my fifty pounds, but Mr.
Somerled brushed aside her objections in that determined way he has even
in little things. He said that it would be money in his pocket, as an
artist, to paint me in this gown; and that I must sit for him in it. He
would call his picture "The Girl in the White Dress"; and as he'd show
it in London and New York and get a big price, of course he must be
allowed to pay for the dress. Mrs. James seemed doubtful about the