ELLY came into the drawing-room and found Mrs. Martin leaning back in one of the many comfortable armchairs, and all alone. Nelly had changed her dress since luncheon, and wore an unusually simple gown, while her coiffure was as pastoral as a two-day's-old Marcel wave would permit.
“What is the matter with your shoulders?” asked Mrs. Martin, of her somewhat early Victorian niece.
“I have taken off the fichu,” said Nelly; “it made this dress look so studied. Where is Millie?”
Mrs. Martin allowed the subject to be changed, merely altering the angle of a silver mirror on the table near her so that Nelly could occasionally catch glimpses of her banded hair. Mrs. Martin knew that things seen are mightier than things heard.
“Millie went back to her room after lunch without waiting for coffee. I cannot imagine why she should come to stay with me, and then immure herself in her bedroom for a whole day,” volunteered Mrs. Martin placidly.
“She may be making things,” rejoined Nelly, a little vaguely. “She is the kind of girl who loves sewing or any useful work. She is just like a Mrs. Gaskell girl, so quiet and dutiful, and full of thought for others. Did you see how she collected the plates for Spratt at luncheon? It brought home to me how careless we are of servants' trouble.”
“Did you happen to glance at Spratt?” asked Mrs. Martin in an expressionless tone.
“Yes,” said Nelly, “but I do not think he noticed. He was looking at you in a most perplexed way. Perhaps he had forgotten something.”
Mrs. Martin's lips parted in an inscrutable smile, but she made no remark. Nelly kept the silence inviolate for one second. Then she plunged into a burst of irrepressible enthusiasm.
“Oh, I do admire Millie so much! If she had been a minister's daughter, or the wife of a poor curate, she would have raised domesticity into a positive heroism. I should like to write a book about her,” cried Nelly, warming into further flame. “She would always be quite cheerful darning stockings or making blouses, and would never grumble at having to wear useful, ugly clothes instead of frilly pink things. Talking of pink things, Elise was chattering most excitedly about your pink frock—the one you are going to open the Flower Show in to-morrow. I heard her as I crossed the hall. You never heard such a noise. She was positively shrieking. She really shouldn't.”
“I tore it yesterday,” returned Mrs. Martin. “I am sorry, for I was so fond of that frock, but I caught it in a door, and made such a rent that I have had to give it to Elise. She was so full of joy that I think she must be going to wear it on her day out to-morrow. Probably she was enlarging on her future grandeur to the others.”
“She didn't sound pleased,” answered Nelly. “What a pity, a sweet frock like that!”
At that moment the door opened, and Millie entered. Her quiet figure and face were animated by unusual eagerness, and on her arm was carefully folded the frock in question.
“Dear Mrs. Martin,” explained Millie, “I saw this pretty frock hanging over a chair just outside your door last night. I had heard you say it could not be mended, but I thought I saw how it could be done, so I took it to my room. I got up early this morning, and I have just finished it. I don't think it shows much.”
It was an exquisite piece of sewing, as even Elise would have had to admit had she been asked. Mrs. Martin could not find it in her heart to say she had given the dress away. She thanked Millie very much, and Nelly gazed at her aunt's guest with admiring affection.
“I will put it on this afternoon,” said Mrs. Martin.
“No,” replied Millie. “I have set my heart on your wearing it at the Flower Show, as you were going to.”
Mrs. Martin hesitated. But Nelly's voice rose up.
“Of course she will,” she said cordially.
Mrs. Martin took the frock from Millie, and beheld the neat but unmistakable darn across the front width with appreciation, in which she tried hard to infuse a genuine note.
“I must go and find a frock for Elise,” she said, with a sigh. “I have promised her one.”
Nelly's enthusiasm was slightly dashed by the fresh aspect put upon the affair by this remark; but it soon recovered the little douche, and Mrs. Martin on her return found her niece eagerly imbibing the admirable doctrine that one should try to be a daughter to one's hostess.
“Should not that depend,” suggested Mrs. Martin, “to some extent on whether the hostess wishes it? Her domestic affairs may be so organized as to be quite independent of any quantity of daughters.”