“Yes, I am rather late,” replied Maria. “But why on earth didn't you sit down?”
“Do you suppose I am going to sit down more than I can help in this dress?” said her aunt. “There is nothing hurts a silk dress more than sitting down in it. Now if you will hook my collar, Maria. I can do it, but I don't like to strain the seams by reaching round, and I didn't want to trail this dress down the cellar stairs to get Eunice to fasten it up.” Aunt Maria bewailed the weather in a deprecating fashion while Maria was fastening the collar at the back of her skinny neck. “I never want to find fault with the weather,” said she, “because, of course, the weather is regulated by Something higher than we are, and it must be for our best good, but I do hate to wear this dress out in such a storm, and I don't dare wear my cashmere. Mrs. Ralph Wright is so particular she would be sure to think I didn't pay her proper respect.”
“You can wear my water-proof,” said Maria. “I didn't wear it to-day, you know. I didn't think the snow would do this dress any harm. The water-proof will cover you all up.”
“Well, I suppose I can, and can pin my skirt up,” said Aunt Maria, in a resigned tone. “I don't want to find fault with the weather, but I do hate to pin up a black silk skirt.”
“You can turn it right up around your waist, and fasten the braid to your belt, and then it won't hurt it,” said Maria, consolingly.
“Well, I suppose I can. Your supper is all ready, Maria. There's bread and butter, and chocolate cake, and some oysters. I thought you wouldn't mind making yourself a little stew. I couldn't make it before you came, because it wouldn't be fit to eat. You know how. Be sure the milk is hot before you put the oysters in. There is a good fire.”
“Oh yes, I know how. Don't you worry about me,” said Maria, turning up her aunt's creaseless black silk skirt gingerly. It was rather incomprehensible to her that anybody should care so much whether a black silk skirt was creased or not, when the terrible undertone of emotions which underline the world, and are its creative motive, were in existence, but Maria was learning gradually to be patient with the small worries of others which seemed large to them, and upon which she herself could not place much stress. She stood at the window, when her aunt at last emerged from the house, and picked her way through the light snow, and her mouth twitched a little at the absurd, shapeless figure. Her Aunt Eunice had joined her, and she was not so shapeless. She held up her dress quite fashionably on one side, with a rather generous display of slender legs. Aunt Maria did not consider that her sister-in-law was quite careful enough of her clothes. “Henry won't always be earning,” she often said to Maria. To-day she had eyed with disapproval Eunice's best black silk trailing from under her cape, when she entered the sitting-room. She had come through the cellar.
“Are you going that way, in such a storm, in your best black silk?” she inquired.
“I haven't any water-proof,” replied Eunice, “and I don't see what else I can do.”
“You might wear my old shawl spread out.”