"No worse than what you see there every week," Gerrit retorted calmly;
"corsets and feathers and female gimcracks. Plenty of rouge and cologne
too. It will give them something new to stare at and whisper about."

William Ammidon choked on his anger, and his wife laid a gloved hand on
his arm. "You must make up your mind to it," she told him. "It can't hurt
anyone. She is Gerrit's wife, you see."

Above, the shipmaster said to Taou Yuen: "We are going to church with the
family." He surveyed her clothes with a faint glimmer of amusement. She
had, he saw, made herself especially resplendent as a Manchu. The long
gown was straw-colored satin with black bats--a symbol of
happiness--whirling on thickly embroidered silver clouds, over which she
wore a sleeve coat fastened with white jade and glittering with spangles
of beaten copper. Her slippers were pale rose, and fresh apple blossoms,
which she had had brought from the yard, made a headdress fixed with
long silver and dull red ivory pins.

She smiled obediently at his announcement, and, with a fan of peacock
silks and betel nuts in a pouch like a tea rose hanging by a cord from a
jade button, she signified her readiness to proceed.

William had gone on foot with his girls, Jeremy was seldom in church, and
Rhoda, Taou Yuen beside her with Gerrit facing them, followed in the
barouche. It seemed to the latter that they were almost immediately at
the door of North Church. The leisurely congregation filling the walk
stiffened in incredulous amazement as Gerrit handed his wife to the
pavement. Rhoda went promptly forward, nodding in response to countless
stupefied greetings; while Gerrit Ammidon moved on at Taou Yuen's side.