“Yes, black,” Julia replied. “I do not feel like decking myself as for a festival. This is no holiday to us, and Kitty has brought out your plain grenadine for you.”
“And I am horrid in black,” Emma said, plaintively; but she usually submitted to the stronger will of her sister, and so she donned the black dress which made her look so like a nun that, braving Julia’s displeasure, she ventured to tie a bit of lavender ribbon in her hair, and was delighted at the effect.
“Look, isn’t it becoming?” she said. “Surely half-mourning is admissible on the occasion of the new mother’s advent.”
Even Julia admitted that the effect was good, and as she was herself an ardent lover of dress and had adopted her plain garb more from resentment to the living than respect for the dead, she too tried the effect of lavender, and fastened at her throat a pretty bow of ribbon, which brightened her up wonderfully. Alice, who had nothing to resent, and who wished to be as attractive as possible to Godfrey after his long absence, indulged her taste to its fullest extent, and succeeded in getting her hair higher than she had ever gotten it before. Godfrey was of course accustomed to the very latest styles of Parisian hair-dressing, and she did not wish to appear singular to him, she said, when Emma exclaimed:
“Why, Alice, how funny you do look!”
Taken as a whole, she was frightfully and fashionably dressed, and very much pleased with her tout ensemble, and certain she should completely overawe and confound the plain woman of forty, who was momentarily expected. The barouche had been sent for the colonel according to his orders, and Godfrey’s buggy had been sent for him, as he might bring a friend with him, his telegram said. But Robert Macpherson was not quite ready to leave New York, and preferred coming to the country a few days later. So Godfrey drove home alone, choosing a shorter road than that taken by the barouche, and reaching the house some ten minutes earlier than his father.
“Oh, girls, girls, there is Godfrey!” Emma cried, as she caught sight of her brother driving up to the rear of the house; and rushing out to meet him she threw her arms around him and burst into tears.
“Why, Emma, you dear little goose,” he said, as he bent his tall figure down to kiss her, “what are you crying about? Sorry to get your scamp of a brother back, eh?”
“No, no, Godfrey. I’m so glad to have you, only I dread that woman! Is she so very horrid?”
“Horrid! Who horrid?” Godfrey asked, while every muscle of his face twitched with suppressed mirth. “Do you mean the new mother? You must not mind her looks; beauty is only skin deep, and she is like a singed cat, better than she looks. You are sure to like her. Ah, Julia, my darling, how like a sister of charity you look!” he continued, as he released Emma, and kissing his other sister affectionally, he wound an arm around each of the girls, and walked to the house, where Alice was waiting for him, and scanning him curiously.