"I daresay—but still ... of course he's clever," owned Toni rather grudgingly, "he must be, to be a dentist, but—no, Fan, I'm not going to marry Mr. Dowson, so there!"
"Oh, all right." Fanny was a philosopher. "You know your own business best. Will you do me up, dear, and tell me how you like my frock? I think myself it's rather striking."
Thus besought, Toni stuck the last pin-casually in her hair and came to give her assistance in the matter of "doing up."
Miss Frances Gibbs' dress was composed of a bright rose-pink voile, bought cheaply at a sale, ornamented with a sash of ribbon of an equally vivid hue of violet; and striking it certainly was, in the sense that one felt inclined to collapse at sight of it. Miss Gibbs' figure being of the order which dressmakers call "full," the effect was distinctly startling; and as Fanny had carefully arranged her abundant hair in as many rolls as she could possibly manage, it is to be inferred that she presented a more overpowering effect than ever.
Although, possibly owing to her Italian blood, Toni herself had a weakness for bright colours, on other people, this daring juxtaposition of pink and violet was a trifle bizarre even for her taste; and she looked critically at Fanny as the latter paraded under the gas jet in order to show off the "creation" to its best advantage.
"Well?" Fanny's tone was anxious; and Antonia flung scruple to the winds.
"It's lovely, Fan, and you look scrumptious in it!" She hastily produced from a paper bag a bunch of violets she had intended for her own adornment. "Here, let me pin these in for you, they will finish you off beautifully."
"But they're yours, Toni!"
"Oh, never mind me!" Toni laughed recklessly. "I've not got a Josh waiting for me downstairs—and anyway, I don't much care to wear flowers, they die so quickly, poor dears."
Her own frock, an oft-washed white muslin, was donned in a second. A bright green ribbon round her waist, a pair of greenstone earrings put in beneath the clustering black hair, giving her a quaintly picturesque look, and Antonia was ready for the evening's jollity.