"Ain't!" Hosea Brewster was startled into it. "They're artists, aren't
they? Most of 'em?"

"No! Out-of-town folks, mostly, like you. West--Iowa an' Californy an'
around there. Livin' here, though. Seem t' like it better'n where they
come from. I dunno."

Hosey Brewster took to eying them as Mrs. Brewster had eyed the women.
He wondered about them, these tight, trim men, rather short of breath,
buttoned so snugly into their shining shoes and their tailored clothes,
with their necks bulging in a fold of fat above the back of their white
linen collars. He knew that he would never be like them. It wasn't his
square-toed shoes that made the difference, or his gray hat, or his
baggy trousers. It was something inside him--something he lacked, he
thought. It never occurred to him that it was something he possessed
that they did not.

"Enjoying yourself, Milly?"

"I should say I am, father."

"That's good. No housework and responsibility to this, is there?"

"It's play."

She hated the toy gas stove, and the tiny ice chest, and the screen
pantry. All her married life she had kept house in a big, bounteous way:
apples in barrels; butter in firkins; flour in sacks; eggs in boxes;
sugar in bins; cream in crocks. Sometimes she told herself, bitterly,
that it was easier to keep twelve rooms tidy and habitable than one