"I hope you have," interrupted Sylvia politely.

"Yes, as well as could be expected--you know I ain't over an' above
strong this season. My old trouble. But then, I don't complain any--only
as I said to Joe, it is awful tryin'. Have you heard how the new
minister's wife is doin'? She ain't ben to evenin' meetin' at all regular
sence she got here, an' she made an angel cake, just for her own family,
last Wednesday. She puts her washin' out, too. I got it straight from
Mrs. Jones, next door to her. I went there the other evenin' to get a
nightgown pattern she thought was real tasty. I don't know as I shall
like it, though. It's supposed to have a yoke made out of crochet or
tattin' at the top, an' I ain't got anything of the kind on hand just
now, an' no time to make any. Besides, I've never thought these
new-fangled garments was just the thing for a respectable woman--there
ain't enough to 'em. When I was young they was made of good thick cotton,
long-sleeved an' high-necked, trimmed with Hamburg edgin' an' buttoned
down the front. Speakin' of nightgowns, how are you gettin' on with your
trousseau? Have you decided what you're goin' to wear for a weddin'
dress? I was readin' in the paper the other day about some widow that got
married down in Boston, an' she wore a pink chif_fon_ dress. I was real
shocked. If she'd ben a divorced person, I should have expected some such
thing, but there warn't anything of the kind in this case--she was a
decent young woman, an' real pretty, judgin' from her picture. But I
should have thought she'd have wore gray or lavender, wouldn't you? There
oughtn't to be anything gay about a second weddin'! Well, as I was sayin'
to Joe about the minister's wife--What's that? You think they're both
real nice, an' you're glad he's got _some_ sort of a wife? Now, Sylvia, I
always did think you was a little mite hard on Mr. Jessup. I says to Joe,
'Joe, Sylvia's a nice girl, but she's a flirt, sure as you're settin'