Katie stroked her curls with a patronizing kindness, and answered: "No, Miss Foolishness, that would be wretched taste. To the school-room, the school dress. Ladies have the proper toilet for all occasions." Then, before any one could answer her, she dropped her little air of instruction, and said, with the frankness of equality: "Girls, you must excuse me appearing in such a morning toilet. The fact is, I am going to the matinée, and one likes to be early at a Gerster matinée. You know how little time Madame gives us to dress in."
"Oh dear me, there is no need of apology," said Clara May, a trifle defiantly. "One understands quite well that there would be no pleasure in having a suit like that unless there were opportunities to show it; and whether it be in the morning or evening, in the school-room or the opera boxes, is all the same. I don't see why one should not wear as nice things in Madame Blanc's company as in Madame Gerster's; and some people would think a school-room just as worthy of a fine dress as an opera-house."
This argument was received with a murmur of approval. Girls rarely look beneath the surface, and it sounded well; but upon the whole, Katie felt that she had had a great triumph. For a month afterward she wore her brown cloth school suit with the air of one who has vindicated her taste, and who was quite content with its serviceable fitness.
The velvets began to look common, and a little shabby; imitations of a cheaper kind were plentiful on the streets. She almost wondered how she ever could have thought them so desirable. It was just when she had reached this position, when velvet suits had sunk below the tide of wishing for in her mind, that they were again forced on her attention.
One morning Clara May came to school in a state of great excitement. She threw aside her Derby and Ulster, and hastened to the group chatting by the open fire.
"Girls," she said, in a tone which implied something far beyond the words—"girls, I was at the charity fair last night."
"Oh!" from half a dozen voices at once.
"And I saw Agnes Hilton there. She had a stand—Japanese things."
"Did you buy?"
"I priced some scrolls; they were horrid, and very dear. What do you think she wore?"