"I don't go throwin' money away on new hats like you city folks do," she said somewhat tartly. "A hat has to do me three seasons for best an' a fourth for common. I've too much to do to go chasin' after the fashions. I leave that to Bart Coffin's wife."
"Who is Bart Coffin?" inquired Bob, amused by her show of spirit.
"You ain't met Bart?"
"Not yet."
"Well, you will. He's the one who always used to stow all his catch of fish in the bow of the boat 'cause he said it was easier to row downhill. He ain't no heavyweight for brains as you can see, an' years ago he married a wife feather-headed as himself. He did it out of whole cloth, too, so he's got no one to blame if he don't like his bargain. At the time of the weddin' he was terrible stuck up about his bride, an' he gave her a black satin dress that outdid anything the town had ever laid eyes on. It was loaded down with ruffles, an' jet, an' lace, an' fitted her like as if she was poured into it. Folks said it was made in Brockton, but whether it was or not there's no way of knowin'. Anyhow, back she pranced to Wilton in that gown an' for a year or more, whenever there was a church fair, or a meetin' of the Eastern Star, or a funeral, you'd be certain of seein' Minnie Coffin there in her black satin. There wasn't a lay-out in town could touch it, an' by an' by it got so that it set the mark on every gatherin' that was held, those where Minnie's satin didn't appear bein' rated as of no account." Celestina paused, and her mouth took an upward curve, as if some pleasant reverie engrossed her. "But after a while," she presently went on, "there came an upheaval in the styles; sleeves got smaller, an' skirts began to be nipped in. Minnie's dress warn't wore a particle but it looked as out-of-date as Joseph's coat would look on Willie. The women sorter nudged one another an' said that now Mis' Bartley Coffin would have to step down a peg an' stop bein' leader of the fashions."
Celestina ceased rocking and leaned forward impressively.
"But did she?" declaimed she with oratorical eloquence. "Did she? Not a bit of it. Minnie got pictures an' patterns from Boston; scanted the skirt; took in the sleeves; made a wide girdle with the breadths she took out of the front—an' there she was again, high-steppin' as ever!"
Robert Morton laughed with appreciation.
"Since then," continued Celestina, "for at least fifteen years she's been makin' that dress over an' over. Now she'll get a new breadth of goods or a couple of breadths, turn the others upside down or cut 'em over, an' by keepin' everlastingly at it she contrives to look like the pictures in the papers most of the time. It's maddenin' to the rest of us. Abbie Brewster knows Minnie well an' somewhere in a book she's got set down the gyrations of that dress. I wouldn't be bothered recordin' it but Abbie always was a methodical soul. She could give you the date of every inch of satin in the whole thing. Just now there's 1914 sleeves; the front breadths are 1918; the back ones 1911. Most of the waist is January, 1912, with a June, 1913, vest. Half the girdle is made out of 1910 satin, an' half out of 1919. Of course there's lights when the blacks don't all look the same; still, unless you got close up you wouldn't notice it, an' Minnie Coffin keeps on settin' the styles for the town like she always has."
The narrator paused for breath.