“But that’s what I don’t see—”
“You don’t see it because you don’t know Stephen—that is, you don’t know him well.”
“But from what I do know of him—”
“He seems very nice. Yes, of course! But, good Heavens! Elsie, I want a husband who’s something more than very nice!”
“And yet that’s pretty good, as husbands go.”
“If I can’t reach a higher standard than as husbands go I sha’n’t marry any one.”
“Which seems to me what’s very likely to happen.”
“So it seems to me.”
The silence that followed was full of soft, swishing sounds, which I judged to come from the taking off of a dress and the putting on of some sort of negligée. From my experience of the habits of girls, as illustrated by my sisters and their friends, I supposed that they were lending each other services in the processes of undoing. The girl with the mezzo voice had gone up to Elsie’s room to undo her; Elsie had come down to render similar assistance. There is probably a psychological connection between this intimate act and confidence, since girls most truly bare their hearts to each other when they ought to be going to bed.