After the exhibition there was a dance.

The Brewsters, even Mrs.
Zelotes, remained to see the last of Ellen's triumph.

Mrs.Zelotes was firmly convinced that Ellen's appearance excelled any one's in the hall.

Not a girl swung past them in the dance but she eyed her white dress scornfully, then her rosy face, and sniffed with high nostrils like an old war-horse.

"Jest look at that Vining girl's dress, coarse enough to strain through," she said to Fanny, leaning across Andrew, who was sitting rapt, his very soul dancing with his daughter, his eyes never leaving her one second, following her fair head and white flutter of muslin ruffles and ribbons around the hall.
"Yes, that's so," assented Fanny, but not with her usual sharpness.
A wistful softness and sweetness was on her coarsely handsome face.
Once she reached her hand over Andrew's and pressed it, and blushed crimson as she did so.