“Any color so long’s it’s red is the color that suits me best,” Jimmie quoted. “Lord, isn’t this room a pippin?” He swam in among the bright pillows of the divan and so hid his face for a moment. It had been a good many weeks since he had seen Gertrude.
“I want to give a suffrage tea here,” Beulah broke in suddenly. “It’s so central, but I don’t suppose David would hear of it.”
“Angels and Ministers of Grace defend us—” Peter began.
“My mother would hear of it,” David said, “and then there wouldn’t be any little studio any more. She doesn’t believe in votes for women.”
“How any woman in this day and age—” Beulah began, and thought better of it, since she was discussing Mrs. Bolling.
“Makes your blood boil, doesn’t it—Beulahland?” Gertrude suggested helpfully, reaching for the tea cakes. “Never mind, I’ll vote for women. I’ll march in your old peerade.”
“The Lord helps those that help themselves,” 175 Peter said, “that’s why Gertrude is a suffragist. She believes in helping herself, in every sense, don’t you, ’Trude?”
“Not quite in every sense,” Gertrude said gravely. “Sometimes I feel like that girl that Margaret describes as caught in a horrid way between two generations. I’m neither old-fashioned nor modern.”
“I’d rather be that way than early Victorian,” Margaret sighed.
“Speaking of the latest generation, has anybody any objection to having our child here for the holidays?” David asked. “My idea is to have one grand Christmas dinner. I suppose we’ll all have to eat one meal with our respective families, but can’t we manage to get together here for dinner at night? Don’t you think that we could?”