"I would like to see the girl who could make me discard my shirt and blazer," laughed Nan defiantly.
"How would we look en grande toilette with such hands as these," said Jean, thrusting forward her own little brown ones.
"Attractive, but from a different standpoint," Nan asserted with a fine assumption of authority. "Everything depends upon your point of view, according to Henry James. Now, from my artistic pinnacle," tilting her head to one side, and surveying the group with critical, but approving eyes, "I declare I prefer brown hands to white ones."
"By the way," asked Jean, with well-feigned indifference, "what did you think of the naval officers?"
"To return to our muttons," murmured Nathalie, with a sidelong glance at her sister.
"Mr. Dudley was very pleasant and agreeable," replied Emily, "but I thought Mr. Farr rather uninteresting."
"Well," laughed Eleanor demurely, "Nan is right. Everything does depend upon one's point of view. Now I thought Mr. Farr decidedly attractive, and Mr. Dudley just a good-natured boy."
"That reminds me of something I saw in the paper the other day," Jean observed smilingly. "To the question 'What is taste?' the answer was given, 'There is no such thing, except on the principle that some people haven't any.'"
"That is a fine way of disposing of one," and there was an expression of quiet amusement in Eleanor's eyes. "Never mind, dear," leaning forward and pinching Jean's cheek, "I will forgive you. Besides," dropping her voice, "you know that you agree with me."
"Now, what are you girls whispering about?" complained Nathalie. "Oh, bother this sewing," she went on irrelevantly; "I have had enough of it for to-day," and the bit of work was tossed impatiently into her basket.