"But—" expostulated the listener.
"Well, now this is how it was," said Miss Clegg; "an' I'll begin 'way back in the beginnin' so you 'll have it all straight, for it's very needful to have it straight so as to understand just why she is so nigh to half mad. For Mrs. Macy is n't one as gets mad easy, an' so it's well for us as has got to live in the same town with her to well an' clearly learn just how much it takes to use her up.
"Seems, Mrs. Lathrop, as yesterday mornin' Mrs. Macy set out to go to town to buy her some shoes. Seems as she was goin' to take lunch with Busby Bell's cousin Luther Stott's wife as she met at the Lupeys' in Meadville, 'cause they only live three-quarters of an hour from town on two changes of the electric, an' Mrs. Stott told Mrs. Lupey as any time she or her relations got tired of shoppin' she'd be nothin' but happy to have 'em drop in on her to rest 'cause she kept a girl an' her husband's sister, too, so company was n't no work for her herself. Well, Mrs. Macy was goin' to the city an' so she looked up the address an' made up her mind to go there to lunch, an' so she wrote the address on one side of the piece of paper as she had in her black bag an' she wrote her shoes on the other side, for she says they're a new kind of shoes as is warranted not to pinch you in the back, by every magazine an' newspaper—an' you know what Mrs. Macy is on bein' pinched; why, she says she give up belts an' took to carpet slippers just for the very reason as she could not stand bein' pinched nowhere.
"Well, seems as the shoes was Kulosis shoes an' Mrs. Macy says how any one could remember 'em off of paper she can't see anyhow, an' Luther Stott's wife lives 2164 Eleventh Avenue S.W., an' that was very important too, for there's seven other Eleventh Avenues in the city besides eight Eleventh Streets; seems as the new part of the city is laid out that way so as to make it simple to them as knows where they live anyhow.
"Well, Mrs. Macy says she put on her bonnet as happy as any one looks to be afore they know they're goin' to be the first to have a new invention tried on 'em an' then she locked up her house an' set off. She says she never was great on new inventions for she's lived under a lightnin' rod for pretty near forty years an' never come anywhere nigh to be struck once yet, but she says she has now learned to her sorrow as bein' fooled by a lightnin' rod man forty years ago ain't nothin' to bein' fooled by a minister for forty years ahead, for she says she'll lose her guess if this last foolin' don't last forty years or even longer if she lives that long, an' make her wear her felt slippers all the forty years too.
"Well, she says of course you might know as it would be the minister as done her up first on this day of misery, an' it was the minister! She says after that donation party to fix him out with new shirts last week she surely looked to be spared any further inflictions from him for one while; she says the idea as the congregation is expected to shirt the minister was surely most new to her, an' she was dead set against it at first, but she says she come to the fore an' was one to help make him the six when she see as it was expected to be her duty as a Christian, but she says she surely hoped when she hemmed the tail of the last one as she'd seen the last of him for a good breathin' spell.
"But no, Mrs. Lathrop, seems it was n't to be, an' so she learned to her keen an' pinchin' sorrow yesterday mornin', for she was n't more 'n fairly on her way to town when she run square up to him on the bridge an' as a result was just in time to be the first for him to try his new memory system on, an' she told Gran'ma Mullins an' me with tears in her eyes an' her felt slippers solemnly crossed on top of each other, as she can not see why it had to be her of all people an' her shoes of all things, for she says—an' I certainly felt to agree, Mrs. Lathrop—as if there's anythin' on the wide earth as you don't want to apply a memory system to it's your shoes, for shoes is somethin' as is happiest forgot.
"Well, Mrs. Lathrop, seems as this new memory system of the minister's is a thing as he got out of a Sunday School magazine in reward for workin' out a puzzle. Seems you guess big cities till their capital letters spell 'Memory,' an' then you send the answers to the magazine an' a dollar for postage an' packin' an' then they send you the memory system complete in one book for nothin' a tall. Or you can add in a two-cent stamp an' not guess nothin', but the minister guessed 'cause he felt as in his circumstances he had n't ought to waste even two cents! Seems as they had a most awful time afore they found Ypsilanti for the 'Y,' an' for a while they was most afraid they'd have to be reckless with two cents, but they got it in the end an' sent 'em all off, an' the book come back with a injunction forbiddin' it to be lent to no one stamped on every page. Seems it come back day before yesterday an' the minister sat up most of the night commemoratin' the theory, an' then Mrs. Macy says he just got it into him in time for Fate to let him go an' be flung at her right on the bridge! She says she was n't no more mistrustin' trouble than any one does when they meet a loose minister out walkin' an' she says she can't well see how any woman meetin' a man across a bridge can be blamed for not knowin' as he's just grasped a new principle an' is dyin' to apply it to the first thing handy.
"She says he asked her where she was goin' an' she told him frank an' open as she was goin' to the city to buy some shoes as was warranted not to pinch. She says he asked her what kind of shoes they was an' she opened her little bag an' got out the paper an' read him as they was Kulosis shoes. He asked her why she had it wrote down an' she told him as she had it wrote down so as not to forget the kind an' maybe get pinched again.
"Well, she says she was standin' sideways an' was n't watchin' particular, so she was n't in no state to suspect nothin' when he told her as she could easy throw that piece of paper away an' go to town without it. She says she told him as she knowed that she could easy throw the piece of paper away an' go to town without it, but how was she to remember her shoes which was the reason why she was takin' the piece of paper along with her? Then she says as he said as he'd show her how to remember her shoes an' welcome an' she says as she thought as long as it was welcome she might as well stand still, so she did.