“Yes, indeed, if you like. Here, I’ll help you select for it.”
“Lulu,” said her father, “you have forgotten to take off your hood and coat. Do so at once, daughter, you will be apt to catch cold wearing them in this warm room.”
“I was just on the point of asking her if she wouldn’t take off her things and stay awhile,” laughed Violet, as Lulu hastened to obey.
Before the dinner bell rang, Lulu had again dressed two fairies, which she thought quite an improvement upon the first two. She exhibited them to her father with pride and satisfaction, asking if he did not think them pretty.
“Yes,” he answered with a smile, “I am hardly a competent judge of such things, but they are pleasing to my eye; all the more so, I suspect, because they are the handiwork of my own little girl.”
Immediately after dinner the whole party set out for the Oaks, some riding, others driving. They arrived just as the exhibition was about to begin, and of course had no opportunity to speak to any of the young people—who were all engaged behind the scenes—till it was over.
The spectators declared themselves much pleased with the whole performance, every tableau a decided success, and some of them really beautiful.
Lulu and Grace, seated in front of their father and Violet, enjoyed thoroughly every thing they saw, taking special interest in the tableaux in which Evelyn and Max took part.
In the last one Eva appeared as a Swiss peasant girl, and a very pretty one she made.
The instant the curtain dropped she hastened, without waiting to change her dress, into the parlor where were the spectator guests, and made her way to Lulu’s side.