"She's not stiff—she's amenable to reason," Miss Toland said, smiling vaguely. "We—we have really good times together."
"I hope she's improved in appearance," Mrs. Toland remarked severely. "You remember how dreadfully she looked, Barbara?"
Barbara smiled, half lifted dubious brows, and shrugged slightly.
"She's enormously improved," Miss Toland said sharply. "She wears an extremely becoming uniform now."
"She's evidently got your number, Auntie," Barbara said, watching three young men who were entering the room. "She evidently knows that you're nutty about appearances!"
"I am not nutty about appearances at all," her aunt responded, as she attacked an elaborate ice. "I like things done decently, and I like to see Julia in her nice, trim dresses. That Eastern woman I tried, Miss Knox, wouldn't hear of wearing a uniform—not she! Julia has more sense."
"I expect that Julia hasn't an idea in her head that you haven't put there," Barbara said dryly.
"Don't you believe it!" her aunt said with fire. She seemed ready for further speech, but interrupted herself, and was contented with a mere repetition of her first words, "Don't you believe it."
"Your geese are all swans, Sanna," Mrs. Toland said, with a tolerant smile.
"Very likely," Miss Toland said briefly, drinking off her black coffee at a draught. "Now," she went on briskly, "where are you good people going? Julia's to meet me here in the Turkish Room at two; we have to pick out a hundred books, to start our library."