She was clad in a gown of some light gray material, made very plainly, but fitting her graceful figure to perfection. Simple bands of linen were just visible at her throat and wrists, while a knot of pale blue ribbon fastened her collar.
She looked lovely. She would have been so in anything; but he saw that her toilet was hardly befitting the ward of his wife.
“Girls for commencement always have a new dress, don’t they?” he asked. “Have you made any arrangements of the kind?”
“No, sir; I shall go just as I am. This is the best that I have,” she returned, glancing down at her dress and flushing slightly.
“How much time have you before the exercises begin?” he inquired.
“An hour or more,” she said, looking up at the clock on the mantel. “I am ready very early,” she added, smiling, “for I wished to look over my essay before reading it.”
Mr. Richards looked grave. He remembered how Josephine had been all “fuss and feathers” at every commencement, and here this lovely girl was going to appear before a crowded hall in a dress which his daughter would not have worn in her own private room.
“If you will step around to Hunt & Co.’s with me, you shall have one of those pretty summer silks that they are advertising so extensively. I should be gratified to have you as well dressed as your classmates, and I fear that your needs have been neglected in this respect,” he remarked, with a slight frown.
Star flushed scarlet now.
She had wished—oh, so earnestly!—that morning that she could have something dainty to wear, and she had sighed regretfully as she thought of all her pretty clothes lying at the bottom of the ocean, for they had been prettily made, although they were of inexpensive material; and she had heard the girls talking of the new dresses which were being made for them. But when her toilet was completed and she looked in the glass, she felt that, notwithstanding the disadvantage of her apparel, there was at least a distinguished air about her which bespoke the true lady, and she was comforted.