“Real handsome,” said Mrs. Field.
“Some folks have found fault with it because it didn't have more clothes on, but it ain't as if it was in a cemetery. Of course it would have to be dressed different if it was. An' it ain't anything but marble, when you come right down to it. I think there's such a thing as bein' too particular, for my part, don't you?”
“Yes, I do,” replied Mrs. Field, looking out at the marble figure.
“Well, I do. Mis' Jay said, after my husband died, that she should think I'd like to put up that image for a kind of monument for him. I didn't feel as if I could put up anything more than stones; but I did think a little of it, and I knew if I did, I should have to have some wings made on it, and a cape or a shawl over the neck and arms; but out here it's different. I look out at it a good many times, an' I'm thankful it ain't got any more on, clothes do get so out of fashion. You know how they look in photographs sometimes. I s'pose that's the reason that the men who make these images don't put any more on. There! I must show you my photograph album, Esther.”
Mrs. Maxwell took a heavy album with gilt clasps from the centre-table, and drew a chair close to Mrs. Field.
“Now you get a chair, an' come on the other side, Lois,” said she, “an' I can show 'em to both of you.”
Lois obeyed, and Mrs. Maxwell turned over the album leaves and explained the pictures.
“This is a lady I used to know,” said she. “She lived in North Elliot. She's dead now. That's her husband; he's married again. His second wife's kind of silly. Ain't much like the first one. She was a real stepper. That's Flora Lowe's baby—the first one—an' that's Flora. I think it flatters her. That's my Flora. It ain't very good. She looks terrible sober. There's my poor husband. I s'pose you remember him, Esther? Of course you know how he used to look. Do you think it's a good likeness?”
“I don't know. I guess it's pretty good, ain't it?” stammered Mrs. Field.
“Well, some think it is, and some don't. I ain't never liked it very well myself, but it was all I had. It was taken some years before he died. I guess jest about the time you was down here. There! I s'pose you know whose this is?”