"Good night," repeated Cora, offering hers. The guests took them with
the air of culprits; relief was evidently drowned in astonishment.

"Well, good night--if we must," they said awkwardly.

Mrs. Baldwin, looking into the library half an hour later, found the
twins sitting there alone.

"Where are your cavaliers?" she demanded.

"They left long ago," Dora explained sleepily. "Mayn't we go to bed?"

"Oh, for pity's sake--go!" was the exasperated answer.

In the morning the twins appeared braced for revolution. When a
reception for that afternoon was mentioned, they announced firmly that
they were not going.

"I think you are wise," said Mrs. Baldwin amiably. "You both look
tired."

They were conscious of disappointment as well as relief; it was the
establishment of a principle they wanted, not coddling. Three weeks went
by in the same debilitating peace. The twins were smiled on and left
wholly free. They had almost come to believe in a bloodless victory,
when Mrs. Baldwin struck--a masterly attack where they were weakest. Her
weapon was--not welcome temper, but restrained pathos.

"A mere fourteen at dinner and a few coming in to dance afterward, and
I do want you twinnies to be there. Now I have not asked one thing of
you for three weeks; don't you think you owe Mother some little return?"

"But--!" began the twins, with a rush of the well-known arguments. Mrs.
Baldwin would not combat.

"I ask it as a favor, dear girls," she said gently. They clung to their
refusal, but were obviously weakening when she rose to her climax: "Mr.
White and Mr. Morton have accepted!" She left them with that, confident
and humming to herself.

The twins stared at each other in open misery. Reappear now, after the
solemn declaration they had made to those two! Their cheeks burned at
the thought. They mounted to their room to formulate their resistance,
and found two exquisite new gowns, suitable for fairy princesses, spread
out like snares. "To please Mother" seemed to be written on every artful
fold. And Mrs. Baldwin was not a rich woman, for her way of life; such
gowns meant self-denial somewhere. The twins had tears in their eyes.

"But if we give in now, we're lost!" they cried.

Nothing more was said about the dinner, Mrs. Baldwin gaily assuming
success, but avoiding the topic. The twins wore a depressed and furtive
air. On the fatal day they had a long interview with Miss Browne, of the
Browne School, and came awa