"'It's a dog's life, livin' in a little town—in some respects,' I remember Mis' Sykes says.
"'Well,' says Mis' Toplady, tolerant, 'I know. I know it is. But I'd rather live in a little town an' dog it out than go up to the city an' turn wolf, same as some.'
"An' yet we all felt the same, every one of us. They ain't a woman livin' in a little place that don't feel the same, now and again. It's quiet an' it's easy housework, an' you get to know folks well. But oh, none of it what you might say glitters. An' they ain't no woman whatever—no matter how good a wife an' mother an' Christian an' even housekeeper she is—that don't, 'way down deep in her heart, feel that hankerin' after some sort o' glitter.
"So it was natural enough that we should draw up at Lyddy's dressmakin' window an' rest ourself. An' that afternoon we'd have done so, anyway, for she hed been pinnin' up her new summer plates—Lyddy don't believe in rushin' the season. An' no sooner had we got a good look at 'em—big coloured sheets they was, with full-length pictures—than Mis' Toplady leaned 'way forward, her hands on her knees, an' stood lookin' at 'em the way you look at the parade.
"'Well, look-a-there,' she says. 'Look at that one.'
"The one she meant was a woman with her hair all plaited an' fringed an' cut bias, an' with a little white hat o' lilacs 'bout as big as a cork; an' her dress—my land! Her dress was long an' rill light blue, an' seemed like it must have been paper, it was so fancy. It didn't seem like cloth goods at all, same as we hed on. It was more like we was wearin' meat an' vegetable dresses, an' this dress was dessert—all whipped cream an' pink sugar an' a flower on the plate.
"'Dear land!' says Mis' Toplady, lookin' 'round at us strange, 'do they do it when they get gray hair? I didn't know they done it when their hair was gray.'
"We all looked, an' sure enough, the woman's hair was white. 'Afternoon Toilette for Elderly Woman,' it said underneath, plain as plain. Always before the plates hed all been young an' smilin' an' party-seemin', an' we'd thought of all that as past an' done for, with us, along with all the other things that didn't come true. But here was a woman grayer than any of us, an' yet lookin' as live as if she'd been wearin' a housework dress.
"'Why,' says Mis' Sykes, starin', 'that must be a new thing this season. I never heard of a woman well along in years wearin' anything but brown or navy blue or gray,—besides black.' Mis' Sykes is terribly dressy, but even she never yet got anywheres inside the rainbow, except in a bow at the chin.