re.
She had executed commissions for Mrs. Maldon. She had been an unpaid
housekeeper to her father and brother. Now she was shopping as
mistress of a house and of money. She owed an account of her outlay
to nobody, not even to Louis. She recalled the humble and fantastic
Saturday night when she had shopped with Louis as reticule-carrier
... centuries since. The swiftness and unforeseeableness of events
frightened the girl masquerading as a wise, perfected woman. Her heart
lay like a weight in her corsage for an instant, and the next instant
she was in the bright system again, because she was so young.

Here and there in the streets, and in small groups in the chief shops,
you saw prim ladies of every age, each with a gloved hand clasped over
a purse. (But sometimes the purse lay safe under the coverlet of
a perambulator.) These purses made all the ladies equal, for their
contents were absolutely secret from all save the owners. All the
ladies were spending, and the delight of spending was theirs. And in
theory every purse was inexhaustible. At any rate, it was impossible
to conceive a purse empty. The system wore the face of the ideal.
Manners were proper to the utmost degree; they neatly marked the
equality of the shoppers and the profound difference between the
shoppers and the shopkeepers. All ladies were agreeable, all babies in
perambulators were darlings. The homes thus represented by ladies and
babies were clearly polite homes, where reigned suavity, tranquillity,
affection, and plenty. Civilization was justified in Wedgwood
Street and the market-place--and also, to some extent, in St. Luke's
Square.... And Rachel was one of these ladies. Her gloved hand closed
over a purse exactly in the style of the others. And her purse, regard
being had to the inheritance of her husband, was supposed to hide vast
sums; so much so that ladies who had descended from distant heights
in pony-carts gazed upon her with the respect due to a rival. All
welcomed her into the exclusive, correct little world--not only the
shopkeepers but the buyers therein. She represented youthful love. Her
life must be, and was, an idyll! True, she had no perambulator, but
middle-aged ladies greeted her with wistfulness in their voices and in
their eyes.

She smiled often as she told and retold the story of Louis' accident,
and gave positive assurances that he was in no danger, and would
not bear a scar. She blushed often. She was shyly happy in her