"Oh, how lovely! I can wear them all day, and the gray things all
night--all evening, I mean," Joy exulted. "And maybe I'll never have
to put on the picture dresses at all!"
She went to sleep that night with the brown suit laid out in its box
across the foot of her bed, below her feet, and the gray chiffon
hat, with its golden yellow roses, on a chair by her, where she
could touch it if she woke in the night and thought she had dreamed
it. She said her prayers almost into it; she was so obliged to the
Lord for the hat and the frocks, and the man who had talked to her
in the dark, that she felt as if she ought to take the hat, at
least, and show it to God while she was praying.
* * * * *
They had been in Maine long enough for Joy to discover what a
cottage inn really was. It appeared that the inn itself lived in the
middle, as a sort of parent; and all around it sprang up small
cottages, where you and yours could dwell, and never associate with
anybody you didn't want to, except at mealtime, or lingering about a
little afterwards, or at dances. And if you were unusually exclusive
(also unusually rich), they took you over your meals, and you never
saw anybody at all. Joy was exceedingly glad that Grandfather was
only comfortably off, because she liked, best of all the day's
round, the little times before and after dinner when she could sit
on the porch and watch people, and decide whom she was going to like
most, and whom she was going to be most like.
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