Lady Stafford is in great form, and becomes even more debonnaire and saucy than is her wont. Even Marcia seems to take some interest in it, and lets a little vein of excitement crop up here and there through all the frozen placidity of her manner; while Molly, who has never yet been at a really large affair of the kind, loses her head and finds herself unable to think or converse on any other subject.
Yet in all this beautiful but unhappy world where is the pleasure that contains no sting of pain? Molly's is a sharp little sting that pricks her constantly and brings an uneasy sigh to her lips. Perhaps in a man's eyes the cause would be considered small, but surely in a woman's overwhelming. It is a question of dress, and poor Molly's mind is much exercised thereon.
When all the others sit and talk complacently of their silks and satins, floating tulles and laces, she, with a pang, remembers that all she has to wear is a plain white muslin. It is hard. No doubt she will look pretty—perhaps prettier and fairer than most—in the despised muslin; but as surely she will look poorly attired, and the thought is not inspiring.
No one but a woman can know what a woman thinks on such a subject; and although she faces the situation philosophically enough, and by no means despises herself for the pangs of envy she endures when listening to Maud Darley's account of the triumph in robes to be sent by Worth for the Herst ball, she still shrinks from the cross-examination she will surely have to undergo at the hands of Cecil Stafford as to her costume for the coming event.
One day, a fortnight before the ball, Cecil does seize on her, and, carrying her off to her own room and placing her in her favorite chair, says, abruptly:
"What about your dress, Molly?"
"I don't know that there is anything to say about it," says Molly, who is in low spirits. "The only thing I have is a new white muslin, and that will scarcely astonish the natives."
"Muslin! Oh, Molly! Not but that it is pretty always,—I know nothing more so,—but for a ball-dress—terribly rococo. I have set my heart on seeing you resplendent; and if you are not more gorgeous than Marcia I shall break down. Muslin won't do at all."
"But I'm afraid it must."
"What a pity it is I am so much shorter than you!" says Cecil, regretfully. "Now, if I was taller we might make one of my dresses suit you."