As soon as Anne had locked up she removed with the greatest care her
emerald dress, which she grudged wearing a second longer than was
necessary, and put on an extraordinary dressing-gown, of which it was
hardly too much to say that there was probably not another one exactly
like it in Europe. Hyacinth always said it had been made out of an old
curtain from the Rev Mr Yeo's library in the Devonshire Rectory, and
Anne did not deny it.

She then screwed up her hair into a tight knot, put one small piece of
it into a curling pin, which she then pinned far back on her head (as if
afraid that the effect on the forehead would be too becoming), took off
her dainty green shoes, put on an enormous pair of grotesque slippers,
carpet slippers (also a relic), and went into Hyacinth's room. Anne made
it a rule every evening to go in for a few minutes to see Hyacinth and
talk against everyone they had seen during the day. She seemed to regard
it as a sacred duty, almost like saying her prayers. Hyacinth sometimes
professed to find this custom a nuisance, but she would certainly have
missed it. Tonight she was smiling happily to herself, and took no
notice of Anne's entrance.

'I suppose you think it went off well,' said Anne aggressively.

'Didn't it?'

'I thought the dinner was ridiculous. A young girl like you asking two
or three friends needn't have a banquet fit for a Colonial Conference.
Besides, the cook lost her head. She sent up the same dish twice.'

'Did she? How funny! How was that?'