What we are wishing for--though I
don't know that we really _want_ anything--do we, girls? But what
we might buy, if you had it very cheap, is a bit of something light and
airy that would make up very elegantly for the evening. Do you care to
have another evening-dress, Matty? I know you have a good few in your
wardrobe."
"I don't know," said Matty, "until I see what Mrs. Middlemass has. I
don't want anything common. I can get common things at Perry's; and
perhaps I had better send for my best dress to London, ma."
This remark of giggling Miss Matty's was really astute for she knew that
Mrs. Middlemass held Perry, the draper, in the most sovereign contempt.
"Right you are, my dear," said the pedler, a smile of gratified vanity
spreading over her face, "you _can_ get your common things, and
very common things they'll be, at Perry's. But maybe old Auntie
Middlemass can give you something as genteel as the London shops. You
look here, my pretty. Now, then."
Here Mrs. Middlemass went on her knees, and with slow and exasperating
deliberation, unfastened a parcel carefully done up in white muslin.
From the depths of this parcel she extracted a very thin and crackling
silk of a shade between brick and terra-cotta, which was further shot
here and there with little threads of pale blue and yellow.
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