Claire shook her head. "It's cut rather too low," she said.
But Miss Proll would not listen to any such argument. "I've a black-lace shawl ... my mother's. If you put that about your shoulders...."
Claire allowed herself to be persuaded. She had very little heart in the adventure, anyway, and Miss Proll seemed to be taking such a tremulous joy in being daring by proxy. In the end the results justified the choice. The black-lace shawl tempered the gown's wanton splendor, and, lacking any exaggeration of hair or complexion, Claire's personality glowed warmly but without flare. She emerged neither the Claire of church-social evenings nor Café Ithaca midnights, but a Claire tempered into the crucible of both these divergent experiences.
Nellie Holmes, answering the message sent through Danilo, arrived in time to put one or two deft touches to the general effect, a twist here and a soft pat there, that added a chic note to Miss Proll's rather prim efforts.
"Well, Robson," she said, standing off critically, "but you do give swell clothes a chance, don't you? Friend Danilo ought to throw his chest out about twelve inches when he gets his eyes on you to-night. By the way, what is the matter with him? He looks like a sick kitten that's been rained on. I never did see such a sad comedian. The face he's wearing these days ain't much of a compliment to you."
The taxicab came promptly at half past eight.
Claire went in to say good-by to her mother. But Mrs. Robson merely opened her eyes, and closed them again.
"I don't think she knows me," Claire faltered. "I wonder whether I ought to go? What do you think, Nell? The whole thing seems such a farce!"
Her passionate exclamation brought a questioning lift of the eyebrows to Nellie Holmes's face. "What do you mean, Robson? Your mother is all right.... I don't think Danilo would let you leave if.... Tell me, have you and Danilo...."
"No. I'm just tired, Nell. Let me go and have it over with."