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280 There was no reason why they should not go to town, especially, so she privately informed Mrs. Myers, as Hilda was moping. She could guide them anywhere where they might wish to go.

And this is how the three ladies came to be seen at Marshall and Snelgrove's, linen drapers, so called; at Redmayne's and Redfern's, and at Jay's, for Hilda's sombre bedecking. Jay's has been called the "mourning warehouse" of the world, not because Jay keeps on tap a perennial and unfailing supply of tears, but because "all they (feminine) that mourn" may be suitably clad—at enormous expense, by the way—by Jay and Co.

And here it was that our little party, sweeping into one of the superb parlours where models display Jay's sombre wares, came face to face with Mrs. Jamieson, who, seated upon a broad divan, was gazing at a little blonde, of her own size and colouring, who displayed for her benefit a flowing tea-gown of soft, black silk, lighted up here and there with touches of gleaming white.

Of course there were greetings and exclamations, and such converse as may be held in so public a place; and Ruth, who, somehow, made herself spokesman for the party, exclaimed that they had "just run over for that little outing, and because Hilda needed the change.