"I'm afraid I have not considered such a detail."
"None of us," Helen went on blandly, "has ever put on a hat to go to the farm. I should hate any of us to do it. Notya, you can't."
"You forget," Mildred Caniper said in her coldest tones, "that I have not been accustomed to going there."
"Well, do notice Lily's primroses," Helen said pleasantly. "They're like sunshine, and she's like—"
"No, please," John begged.
"I wonder why Rupert has not come to supper," Mildred Caniper said, changing the subject, and Helen wondered pityingly why one who had known unhappiness should not be eager to spare others.
"But," Miriam began, her interest overcoming dread of her stepmother's prejudices, "we shall have to wear hats for John's wedding. I shall have a new one and a new dress, a dusky blue, I think, with a sheen on it."
"Did you mention my wedding?" John asked politely.
"Yes. And a peacock's feather in my hat. No, that's unlucky, but so beautiful."
"Nothing beautiful," Helen said, "can be unlucky."