pose she has it, even when she hasn't a mind to work at it," said
Burton, making his pipe purr with a long, deep inspiration of
satisfaction. "I know I have mine."

"What _is_ her business?" asked Ludlow.

"Well, she's a dressmaker and milliner--when she _is_." Mrs. Burton
stated the fact with the effect of admitting it. "You mustn't suppose
that makes any difference. In a place like Pymantoning, she's 'as good
as anybody,' and her daughter has as high social standing. You can't
imagine how Arcadian we are out here."

"Oh, yes, I can; I've lived in a village," said Ludlow.

"A New England village, yes; but the lines are drawn just as hard and
fast there as they are in a city. You have to live in the West to
understand what equality is, and in a purely American population, like
this. You've got plenty of independence, in New England, but you
haven't got equality, and we _have_,--or used to have." Mrs. Burton
added the final words with apparent conscience.

"Just saved your distance, Polly," said her husband. "We haven't got
equality now, any more than we've got buffalo. I don't believe we ever
had buffalo in this section; but we did have deer once; and when I was
a boy here, venison was three cents a pound, and equality cheaper yet.
When they cut off the woods the venison and the equality disappeared;
they always do when the woods are cut off."

"There's enough of it left for all practical purposes, and Mrs.
Saunders moves in the first circles of Pymantoning," said Mrs. Burton.

"When she _does_ move," said Burton. "She doesn't _like_ to move."

"Well, she has the greatest taste, and if you can get her to do
anything for you your fortune's made. But it's a favor. She'll take a
thing that you've got home from the city, and that you're frantic
about, it's so bad, and smile over it a little, and touch it here and
there, and it comes out a miracle of style and becomingness. It's like
magic."

"She _was_ charming," said Ludlow, in dreamy reminiscence.

"_Isn't_ she?" Mrs. Burton demanded. "And her daughter gets all her
artistic talent from her. Mrs. Saunders _is_ an artist, though I don't
suppose you like to admit it of a dressmaker."

"Oh, yes, I do," said Ludlow. "I don't see why a man or woman who
drapes the human figure in stuffs, isn't an artist as well as the man
or woman who drapes it in paint or clay."

"Well, that's sense," Mrs. Burton began.

"She didn't know you had any, Ludlow," her husband explaine