"Ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!" Martha derided, making faces. "That's what you mean, really. Only you don't say it. You know you don't want to fall down now—just because of what Mrs. Benton would say! I'd like to show her a thing or two myself. I bet I could get a dozen women into this, who'd work just for spite!"
"That's not a nice way to work!"
"But it cooks the hash, mammie!"
Martha chuckled toward her mother. She kept repeating it—that new gesture toward her. A perplexing sort of amused understanding of her mother kept shining out of her eyes all the time she sat at dinner, talking to her father.
As soon as she had washed the dishes she took the car and set forth twinkling to rally workers. She came back about five with two suit cases full of cut or basted costumes. These she deposited on the floor of the living room, and proceeded to examine them, talking all the time of her success. White wings she shook out, and curious red calico legs she unfolded. Emily was sitting on the sofa. And Martha was standing by the living-room table—where she had stood, exactly, when she announced, "Richard Quin is getting a divorce." She bent down and lifted up a cerise crinoline sort of wide ruche.
"Now, what do you make of this, mammie? This must be for a villain!" And she put it around her neck—it had no fastening, yet—and holding it tightly together, she danced across the room, and looked at herself absurdly in a mirror.
"Believe me, mammie, this is going to be a play!"
Her manner was so triumphant, that Emily was overcome by her impulse.
"Martha!" she exclaimed, "What HAS happened to you? What's the matter?"
The girl faced about abruptly. She stared intently at her mother. And as she looked her face changed. It lost that new expression of admiration with which she had warmed her mother's heart all day. And when she spoke her voice was almost bitter.