Dodo laughed.
"I shall make a little golden hoop for him like the apostles in the Arundels, and another for you, and when nobody else is there you can take them off, and play hoops with them. I expect the apostles did that when they went for a walk. You couldn't wear it round your hat, could you?"
Miss Grantham instantly annexed Dodo.
"Dodo," she said, "come and take my part. These gentlemen say you shouldn't cultivate emotions."
"No, not that quite," corrected Jack. "I said it was expensive for your friends if they had to make themselves miserable, in order to afford food for your emotions."
"Now, isn't that selfish?" said Miss Grantham, with the air of a martyr at the stake. "Here am I ready to be drawn and quartered for anyone's amusement, and you tell me you are sorry for your part, but that it costs too much. Maud, come off that sofa, and take up the daggers for a too unselfish woman."
"I expect I don't know much about these things," said Maud.
"No; Maud would not go further than wrapping herself in a winding-sheet of blue worsted," remarked Dodo incisively.
Maud flushed a little.
"Oh, Dodo!" she exclaimed deprecatingly.