s
wrappings had been temporarily mitigated by the assertion that unless
one danced in gowns like that, one simply couldn't be expected to dance
at all. "Of course, if you wish me to be a wall-flower like Margaret
Blair," Mary Byrd had protested with wounded dignity; and since Mrs.
Culpeper wished nothing on earth so little as that, her only response
had been, "Well, I hope to heaven that you won't let your father see
it!"

Now, as her husband was heard descending the stairs, she said hurriedly:
"Mary Byrd, if you won't put a scarf over your knees, I wish you would
wear one around your neck."

"Oh, Father won't mind," retorted Mary Byrd flippantly. "He is a real
sport, and he knows that you have to play the game well if you play it
at all." Then turning with her liveliest air, she remarked as Mr.
Culpeper entered: "Father, darling, I've just said that you were a
sport."

Mr. Culpeper surveyed her with portentous disapproval. He adored her,
and she knew it, but because it was impossible for his features to wear
any expression lightly, the natural gravity of his look deepened to a
thundercloud.

"Is Mary Byrd going in swimming?" he demanded not of his daughter, but
of the family.

"No, you precious, only in dancing," replied Mary Byrd, as she rose
airily and placed a kiss above the thundercloud on his forehead.

"Will you go looking like this?"

"Not if I can possibly look any worse." She swayed like a golden lily
before his astonished gaze. "Can you suggest any way that I might?"

"I cannot." His face cleared under the kiss, and he held her at arm's
length while paternal pride softened his look. "Do you really mean that
you won't shock the young men away from you?" It was as near a jest as
he had ever come, and a ripple of amusement passed over the room.

"I may shock them, but not away." The girl was really a wonder. How in
the world, he asked himself, did she happen to be his daughter?

"Do you mean that all the other girls dress like this?" It was his final
appeal to an arbitrary but acknowledged authority.

"All the popular ones. You can't wish me to dress like the unpopular
ones, can you?"

His appeal had failed, and he accepted defeat with the sober courage his
father had displayed in a greater surrender.

"Well, I suppose if everybody does it, it is all right," he conceded;
and though he was not aware of it, he had compressed into this
convenient axiom his whole philosophy of conduct.

As he cros