Then they
was laid away until the Grand Annual Masquerade Ball of the Order of the
Eastern Star, which is a kind of hen Masons, when she again gave us a
flash of what New York society ladies was riding their horse in. As a
matter of fact, Henrietta hates a horse like a rattlesnake, but she had
done her pioneer work for once and all.
"Every one was now laughing and sneering at the old-fashioned divided
skirt with which woman had endangered her life on a horse, and wondering
how they had endured the clumsy things so long; and come spring all the
prominent young society buds and younger matrons of the most exclusive
set who could stay on a horse at all was getting theirs ready for the
approaching season, Red Gap being like London in having its gayest
season in the summer, when people can get out more. Even Mis' Judge
Ballard fell for it, though hers was made of severe black with a long
coat. She looked exactly like that Methodist minister, the old one, that
we had three years ago.
"Most of the younger set used the mail-order catalogue, their figures
still permitting it. And maybe there wasn't a lot of trying on behind
drawn blinds pretty soon, and delighted giggles and innocent girlish
wonderings about whether the lowest type of man really ogles as much
under certain circumstances as he's said to.
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