lossy broad strings in a bow
under her round chin when Miss Jocund stepped hastily to the rescue, and
Mrs. Betts entered with a curtsey, and a blue silk slip on her arm.
"What next?" Bessie demanded of the waiting-woman in rosy consternation.

"I am afraid we must trouble you, Miss Fairfax, but not much, I hope,"
insinuated Miss Jocund with a queer, deprecating humility. "There is a
good half hour to spare. Since Eve put on a little cool foliage, female
dress has developed so extensively that it is necessary to try some
ladies on six times to avoid a misfit. But your figure is perfectly
proportioned, and I resolved, for once, to chance it on my knowledge of
anatomy, supplemented by an embroidered dress from your wardrobe. If you
_will_ be _so_ kind: a stitch here and a stitch there, and my delightful
duty is accomplished."

Miss Jocund's speeches had always a touch of mockery, and Bessie, being
in excellent spirits, laughed good-humoredly, but denied her request.
"No, no," said she, "I will not be so kind. Your lovely blue bonnet
would be thrown away if I did not look pleasant under it, and how could
I look pleasant after the painful ordeal of trying on?"

Mrs. Stokes, with raised eyebrows, was about to remonstrate, Mrs. Betts,
with flushed dismay, was about to argue, when Miss Jocund interposed;
she entered into the young lady's sentiments: "Miss Fairfax has spoken,
and Miss Fairfax is right. A pleasant look is the glory of a woman's
face, and without a pleasant look, if I were a single gentleman a woman
might wear a coal-scuttle for me."

At this crisis there occurred a scuffle and commotion on the stairs, and
Bessie recognized a voice she had heard elsewhere--a loud, ineffectual
voice--pleading, "Master Justus, Master Justus, you are not to go to
your granny in the show-room;" and in Master Justus bounced--lovely,
delicious, in the whitest of frilly pinafores and most boisterous of
naughty humors.

Bessie Fairfax stooped down and opened her arms with rapturous
invitation. "Come, oh, you bonnie boy!" and she caught him up, shook
him, kissed him, tickled him, with an exuberant fun that he evidently
shared, and frantically retaliated by pulling down her hair.

This was very agreeable to Bessie, but Miss Jocund looked like an angry
sphinx, and as the defeated nurse appeared she said with suppressed
excitement, "Sally, how often must I warn you to keep the boy out of the
show-room? Carry him away." The flaxen cherub