"Why, Gwendolin, how you do talk," said my grandmother; "the child's father was an American, and she was admitted into this country as an American."
"You must talk with the girl to-morrow, Theodore," continued my aunt, ignoring my grandmother's remark, "and tell her to keep sacred her progenitors. She speaks such perfect English no one would suspect that there was much foreign about her."
"She has a striking, unusual air that would attract a second glance from most people," said my uncle. "If you can keep her nationality from Professor Ballington you will do better than I think you can; he is a great ethnologist; it is his life-work to make discoveries in that line."
"Well it must be kept, no matter what means we resort to," returned my Aunt Gwendolin, with a ring of determination in her voice.
"Poor child," said my dear old grandmother, "she is my granddaughter, and I love her already, my George's child. She looks beautiful to me whether yellow or no."
I had gone down to dinner on this first evening in a soft yellow silk, with long flowing sleeves trimmed with dragons, I know I looked well in it. Governess always said I did. It was partly Chinese and partly European in design. Governess planned it herself, and she said the French were born with a knowledge how to dress artistically; she boasted that she made it to suit my peculiar style.
"Did you notice that China silk she had on at dinner?" said Aunt Gwendolin; "there must be an end to all that; a ban must be put on everything Chinese."
"It was rather becoming I thought," said Uncle Theodore, "in harmony with the clear yellow of her skin. Let her dress alone, she seems to know how to put it. That is a born gift with some women, and if it is not, they never seem to acquire it. There is great elegance in the straight lines of the Oriental dress."
"Let her alone," said Aunt Gwendolin scornfully, "and let the whole city know we have introduced the Yellow Per——"