derful," Varian agreed easily. "There's nobody like Mrs.
Dud, of course."

She stopped her work a moment and looked curiously at him.

"What do you mean by that?" she asked. "You all say it--in just that
way; but I don't think I quite see what you mean. Why is she wonderful?
Because she looks so young?"

"That, in the first place," Varian returned, with a smile, "but not only
that."

"Of course that is very strange," she mused. "Now Lizzie is three years
older than I. You would never think it, would you?"

"No," he agreed, still smiling; "but then, Mrs. Dud looks younger than
everybody. It is her specialty. I think what we mean," he continued,
"is her amazing capacity; she does so much, so ridiculously much, and
so much better than other people. We try to keep up with things--your
sister is a little bit ahead. She seems to have always been doing the
very latest thing, you see. And all her responsibilities, her various
affairs--it makes one's head swim! The women have set themselves
a tremendous field to cover nowadays, and when one succeeds so
admirably--" He paused.

She shook her head thoughtfully.

"But everything is done for her!" she protested. "Why, I have never
yet seen all the servants in this house! And you know there is a
housekeeper? Lizzie sees her a little while in the morning, that's all.
And she never sews a stitch--there's a seamstress here all the time,
you know, and that has nothing to do with the clothes that come home
in boxes. And little Dudley has his tutor, and his old nurse that looks
after his clothes. What is it that she does to make it so wonderful?"

He only smiled at her perplexity, and she added confidentially:

"Lizzie wanted me to go to her dressmaker, but I didn't like the idea of
a man, to begin with, and then I knew Miss Simms would feel so hurt. She
lives in Albany, and she's made my dresses for so long that I thought,
though she may not be so stylish, I'd better keep up with her; wouldn't
you?"

A perfectly unreasonable tenderness surged through his heart. How sweet
she was!

"If she made that dress, I certainly should!" he declared.

She smoothed the crisp lavender folds deprecatingly.

"Oh, this is only a cotton dress," she said. "But she made my gray silk,
too, and Lizzie herself said it fitted beautifully."

She took up the bottle again: it was nearly empty.

"Now my mother," she began, "_she_ was wonderful, if you like. Do you
know what my mother used to do? W