Lena looked at her, and her face did not change. I waited, without saying anything, feeling certain that whatever I said she was in a mood to contradict. So she spoke first.
"It looks grand," she said, "till you think of the work of washin' and ironin' the baby's clothes. And her own. You can bet I shan't keep it in white."
"Look at the baby's hand," I said, "around her one finger."
It was at that moment that the owner of the little gallery came in, with a possible patron. They stood near us, looking at a landscape by the artist of the Madonna.
" ... a wise restraint," he was saying. "Restraint is easy enough—it is like closing one's mouth all the time. The thing is to close it wisely! It is not so much the things that he elects not to include in the composition as it is his particular fashion of omission—without self-consciousness, with no pride of choice. I should say that of all the young artists now working in America, he comes the closest to giving place to the modern movements, seeing them as contributions but not often as ultimates—"
"I'm goin'," said Lena.
I followed her. On the sidewalk, she tossed her head and laughed unpleasantly.
"No such talk as that guy was giving in mine," she said. "He feels smart—that's what ails him. Cossy, I hate folks like that. I hate 'em when they pretend to know so much...."
"What if they do know, Lena?" I said.
"Then I don't want to be with 'em," she answered. "That's easy, ain't it? Sometimes I almost hate you. Ain't they some store where they's a basket of trimmin' remnants we could look at?"