“Oh, Uncle Jethro!” cried Cynthia, “you're trying to get out of it. You remember you promised to meet us in Washington.”
“Guess he'll keep this app'intment,” said Ephraim, who seemed to be full
of a strange mirth that bubbled over, for he actually winked at Jethro.
went first to Faneuil Hall. Presently they found themselves among the
crowd in Washington Street, where Ephraim confessed the trepidation
which he felt over the coming supper party: a trepidation greater, so
he declared many times, than he had ever experienced before any of his
battles in the war. He stopped once or twice in the eddy of the crowd to
glance up at the numbers; and finally came to a halt before the windows
of a large dry-goods store.
“I guess I ought to buy a new shirt for this occasion, Cynthy,” he said, staring hard at the articles of apparel displayed there: “Let's go in.”
Cynthia laughed outright, since Ephraim could not by any chance have worn any of the articles in question.
“Why, Cousin Ephraim,” she exclaimed, “you can't buy gentlemen's things here.”
“Oh, I guess you can,” said Ephraim, and hobbled confidently in at the doorway. There we will leave him for a while conversing in an undertone with a floor-walker, and follow Jethro. He, curiously enough, had some fifteen minutes before gone in at the same doorway, questioned the same floor-walker, and he found himself in due time walking amongst a bewildering lot of models on the third floor, followed by a giggling saleswoman.
“What kind of a dress do you want, sir?” asked the saleslady,—for we are impelled to call her so.
“S-silk cloth,” said Jethro.
“What shades of silk would you like, sir?”
“Shades? shades? What do you mean by shades?”