ooked in the glass.

It _did_ throw up the yellow tints. It threw everything up to her. If she
had owned to a little fear of it before, it affected her now with
positive terror. The thing was young, much too young; and it was brutal
and violent in its youth. It was possessed by a perfect demon of
juvenility; it clashed and fought with every object in the room; it made
them all look old, ever so old, and shabby. And as Miss Quincey stood
with it before the looking glass, it flared up and told her to her face
that she was forty-five--forty-five, and looked fifty.

"Louisa," murmured the Old Lady, "was the only one of our family who
could stand pink."

"I will give it to Louisa," cried Miss Quincey with a touch of passion.

"Tchee--tchee!" At that idea the Old Lady chuckled in supreme derision.
"Capers and nonsense! Louisa indeed! Much good it'll do Louisa when
you've been and nipped all the shape out of it to suit yourself. However
you came to be so skimpy and flat-chested is a mystery to me. All the
Quinceys were tall, your uncle Tollington was tall, your father, he was
tall; and your sister, well; I will say this for Louisa, she's as tall as
any of 'em, and she has a _bust_."

"Yes, I daresay it would have been very becoming to Louisa," said Miss
Quincey humbly. "I--I thought it was lavender."

"Lavender or no lavender, I'm surprised at you--throwing money away on a
thing like that."

"I can afford it," said Miss Quincey with the pathetic dignity of the
turning worm.

Now it was not worm-like subtlety that suggested that reply. It was
positive inspiration. By those simple words Juliana had done something to
remove the slur she was always casting on a certain character. Tollington
Moon had not managed his nieces' affairs so badly after all if one of
them could afford herself extravagances of that sort. The blouse
therefore might be taken as a sign and symbol of his innermost integrity.
So Mrs. Moon was content with but one more parting shot.

"I don't say you can't afford the money, I say you can't afford the
colour--not at your time of life."

Two tears that had gathered in Miss Quincey's eyes now fell on the silk,
deepening the mauve-pink to a hideous magenta.

"I was deceived in the colour," she said as she turned from her
tormentor.

She toiled upstairs to the back bedroom and took it off. She could never
wear it. It was waste--sheer waste; for no other woman could wear it
either; certainly not Louisa;