"O Garry, how can you!"
"Because you've been too gay lately; you're marked for discipline, young lady!"
"Who told you? Shiela?—and it was my newest, dearest, duck of a gown!... The situation was perfectly horrid, too. What elephants men are!"
"You know, I'd accept him if I were you—just to teach him the value of gowns," suggested Hamil.
But Shiela said seriously: "Phil Gatewood is a nice boy. We all knew that he was going to ask you. You acted like a ninny, Cis."
"With my gown half off!—what would you have done?" demanded the girl hotly.
"Destroyed him," admitted Shiela, "in one way or another, dear. And now I am going to bed—if everybody has had enough of Cissy's Bridge—"
"Me for the hay," observed Gray emphatically.
So they all went up the stairway together, lingering a few moments on the landing to say good night.
Cecile retired first, bewailing the humiliation of not having a maid of her own and requesting Shiela to send hers as she was too sleepy to undress.