“Of course you’ve got to do it—­I want to look perfectly lovely!”

“Well—­I dunno’s my hand’s in nowadays,” said Mrs. Heeny in a tone that belied the doubt she cast on her own ability.

“Oh, you’re an artist, Mrs. Heeny—­and I just couldn’t have had that French maid ’round to-night,” sighed Mrs. Spragg, sinking into a chair near the dressing-table.

Undine, with a backward toss of her head, scattered her loose locks about her.  As they spread and sparkled under Mrs. Heeny’s touch, Mrs. Spragg leaned back, drinking in through half-closed lids her daughter’s loveliness.  Some new quality seemed added to Undine’s beauty:  it had a milder bloom, a kind of melting grace, which might have been lent to it by the moisture in her mother’s eyes.

“So you’re to see the old gentleman for the first time at this dinner?” Mrs. Heeny pursued, sweeping the live strands up into a loosely woven crown.

“Yes.  I’m frightened to death!” Undine, laughing confidently, took up a hand-glass and scrutinized the small brown mole above the curve of her upper lip.

“I guess she’ll know how to talk to him,” Mrs. Spragg averred with a kind of quavering triumph.

“She’ll know how to look at him, anyhow,” said Mrs. Heeny; and Undine smiled at her own image.

“I hope he won’t think I’m too awful!”

Mrs. Heeny laughed.  “Did you read the description of yourself in the Radiator this morning?  I wish’t I’d ’a had time to cut it out.  I guess I’ll have to start a separate bag for your clippings soon.”

Undine stretched her arms luxuriously above her head and gazed through lowered lids at the foreshortened reflection of her face.

“Mercy!  Don’t jerk about like that.  Am I to put in this rose?—­There—­you are lovely!” Mrs. Heeny sighed, as the pink petals sank into the hair above the girl’s forehead.  Undine pushed her chair back, and sat supporting her chin on her clasped hands while she studied the result of Mrs. Heeny’s manipulations.

“Yes—­that’s the way Mrs. Peter Van Degen’s flower was put in the other night; only hers was a camellia.—­Do you think I’d look better with a camellia?”

“I guess if Mrs. Van Degen looked like a rose she’d ’a worn a rose,” Mrs. Heeny rejoined poetically.  “Sit still a minute longer,” she added.  “Your hair’s so heavy I’d feel easier if I was to put in another pin.”

Undine remained motionless, and the manicure, suddenly laying both hands on the girl’s shoulders, and bending over to peer at her reflection, said playfully:  “Ever been engaged before, Undine?”

A blush rose to the face in the mirror, spreading from chin to brow, and running rosily over the white shoulders from which their covering had slipped down.

“My!  If he could see you now!” Mrs. Heeny jested.

Mrs. Spragg, rising noiselessly, glided across the room and became lost in a minute examination of the dress laid out on the bed.