While she was changing to linen skirt and
shirtwaist, she began to laugh at herself. How absurd she had
been, thinking to impress this man who had known so many
beautiful women, who must have been satiated long ago with
beauty--she thinking to create a sensation in such a man, with
a simple little costume of her own crude devising. She
reappeared in the studio, laughter in her eyes and upon her
lips. Brent apparently did not glance at her; yet he said,
"What's amusing you?"
She confessed all, on one of her frequent impulses to
candor--those impulses characteristic both of weak natures
unable to exercise self-restraint and of strong natures,
indifferent to petty criticism and misunderstanding, and
absent from vain mediocrity, which always has itself--that is,
appearances--on its mind. She described in amusing detail how
she had planned and got together the costume how foolish his
reception of it had made her feel. "I've no doubt you guessed
what was in my head," concluded she. "You see everything."
"I did notice that you were looking unusually well, and that
you felt considerably set up over it," said he. "But why not?
Vanity's an excellent thing. Like everything else it's got to
be used, not misused. It can help us to learn instead of
preventing."
"I had an excuse for dressing up," she reminded him. "You
said we were to dine together. I thought you wouldn't want
there to be too much contrast between us.
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