on amber beads."

Then they all laughed, and Jim saw that it was good policy to admire
without attempting to suggest reforms.

"And this silk gauze affair, what is this?" asked Nellie. "My! it is so
light you could mail it for a cent."

"That is just a cobweb I fancied," said Gabrielle, proudly, as she
gently shook out the folds of a light creation. "How beautifully it fits
and yet it affords such freedom!"

"It's an Empire modification," remarked Nellie, who discerned the basic
neck-waisted feature of the cobweb's architecture. "Lovely short
sleeves--"

"Bad for mosquitoes," said Jim.

"Hush!" admonished Gabrielle. "We can't restrict art to such
limitations."

"If it really is a cobweb, the mosquitoes won't go near it," said Jim.
"Perhaps the designer had that in mind when he cut down the sleeves."

"What a heavy lace insertion--Valenciennes, a good part of it, isn't it,
Gabrielle?" asked Mrs. Gibson. "Why, it's simply beyond words, I think."

"Three deep embroidered flounces, and such frills and frills of lace!
My! It's grand!" So Nellie believed and declared.

Jim's imagination was not fired. "I hope I never step on it," he said.

"Don't you dare!" commanded Nellie. "This cobweb is meant to catch the
eye only--not a whole man."

While Jim was laughing and attempting to thrust his opinions still
farther upon the critics, they restored the art treasures to the boxes
and placed them in the store-room, where the bride's purchases were
gathering day by day as they arrived from the shopping district.
Fortunately, the tower was larger than it appears from Broadway, or it
would not have held all the packages and allowed the Gibsons room to
live.

Nellie had forgotten the dressmaker, but now started, and Mrs. Gibson
resumed her household duties in another room.

"Gabrielle, you are making altogether too much preparation," said Jim.
"You have undertaken too much. With your regular duties I can see that
it is wearing on you. Could you not be satisfied with less shopping and
less dressmaking?"

"No, Jim, it is not this preparation that burdens me," she replied,
seating herself at the side of her lame hero.

"Tell me what it is, then--is it that miserable fancied conspiracy
against me? I thought your father had forgotten that now."

"He believes that you are gone, and yet I can see that he knows what I
am about to do; at least I fear so. Mother may have told him, for I have
confided in her everything but te