"'Well,' says I, 'I've been sick of Sodality for years. But it was about the most what-you-might-call society I had, and I hated to give it up.'
"'Me, either,' says Mame Holcomb.
"'Me, either,' says Mis' Uppers. 'I declare I've often said I wouldn't know what to do if folks stopped dyin' so's Sodality would have to close out.'
"Mis' Sykes was setting watching the rest of us.
"'Well,' she observes, cold, 'if I was usin' the dead to keep in society, I donno's I'd own it up.'
"Silas Sykes had just come over from the store to see if there was anything he could meddle in.
"'Heh!' says he, showing his teeth. 'Not many of Sodality, as I can see, deserves to die and be done for, civilized.'
"'Don't you worry yourself, Silas Sykes,' says I, 'we're going to be done things for before we die hereafter, and more civilized than ever you dreamed of, all up and down your ledger. That's where you do dream, ain't it, Silas?' I says. And though I said it gay, I meant it frank.
"I remember I looked off down the room, and all of a sudden I see it as it would be that night, packed with folks. Somehow, we'd got to saying less about the Sodality part of the meeting, and more about the open part. Most of the town would be there. We'd got the School Board to leave us announce the second party for that night, following the meeting, and music was coming, and us ladies had froze the ice-cream, and the whole time reminded me of a big bud, flowered slow and bursting sudden.
"'Land, land,' I says, fervent, 'I feel like Friendship Village was a person that I was going to meet to-night for the first time.'