"I see you don't like it!" said Hesper, with a mingling of
displeasure and dismay. "I wish you had come a few days sooner!
It is much too late to do anything now. I might just as well have
gone without showing it to you!--Here, Folter!"
With a look almost of disgust, she began to pull off the dress,
in which, a few hours later, she would yet make the attempt to
enchant an assembly.
"O ma'am!" cried Mary, "I wish you had told me yesterday. There
would have been time then.--And I don't know," she added, seeing
disgust change to mortification on Hesper's countenance, "but
something might be done yet."
"Oh, indeed!" dropped from Folter's lips with an indescribable
expression.
"What can be done?" said Hesper, angrily. "There can be no time
for anything."
"If only we had the stuff!" said Mary. "That shade doesn't suit
your complexion. It ought to be much, much darker--in fact, a
different color altogether."
Folter was furious, but restrained herself sufficiently to
preserve some calmness of tone, although her face turned almost
blue with the effort, as she said:
"Miss Marston is not long from the country, ma'am, and don't know
what's suitable to a London drawing-room."
Her mistress was too dejected to snub her impertinence.
"What color were you thinking of, Miss Marston?" Hesper asked,
with a stiffness that would have been more in place had Mary
volunteered the opinion she had been asked to give.
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