"You don't say anything," Papa said. "Mary can talk to Lavinia."

Mary jumped up and down with excitement. She knew how it would be. In
another minute Aunt Charlotte would come in, dressed in her black lace
shawl and crinoline, and Aunt Lavvy would bring her Opinions. And
something, something that you didn't know, would happen.


III.

Aunt Charlotte came in first with a tight, dancing run. You knew her by
the long black curls on her shoulders. She was smiling as she smiled in
the album. She bent her head as she bent it in the album, and her eyes
looked up close under her black eyebrows and pointed at you.
Pretty--pretty blue eyes, and something frightening that made you look at
them. And something queer about her narrow jaw. It thrust itself forward,
jerking up her smile.

No black lace shawl and no crinoline. Aunt Charlotte wore a blue and
black striped satin dress, bunched up behind, and a little hat perched on
the top of her chignon and tied underneath it with blue ribbons.

She had got in and was kissing everybody while Aunt Lavvy and Uncle
Victor were fumbling with the hat stand in the hall.

Aunt Lavvy came next. A long grey face. Black bands of hair parted on her
broad forehead. Black eyebrows; blue eyes that stuck out wide, that
didn't point at you. A grey bonnet, a grey dress, a little white shawl
with a narrow fringe, drooping.