Read Aunt Crete's Emancipation for Free Online

at "White for you, Crete! What are you thinking of?" Never mind, she was going to have one good time, even if she had to put all her lovely finery away in a trunk afterwards, and never bring it out again, or— dreary thought — were made to cut it over for Luella sometime. Well, it might come to that, but at least she would enjoy it while it was hers.
    Two white linen skirts, a handsome black cloth coat, several pairs of silk gloves, black and white, some undergarments dainty enough for a bride, a whole dozen pairs of stockings! How Aunt Crete rejoiced in those! She had been wearing stockings whose feet were cut out of old stocking legs for fifteen years. She couldn't remember when she had had a whole new pair of stockings all her own. And then two new bonnets.
    All these things were acquired little by little. It was while they were in the millinery department, and Miss Brower had just set a charming black lace bonnet made on a foundation of white roses on the white hair, that Donald decided she was one of the most beautiful old ladies he had ever seen. The drapery was a fine black lace scarf, which swept around the roses and tied loosely on the breast; and it gave the quiet little woman a queenly air. She was getting used to seeing her own face in strange adornments, but it startled her to see that she really looked handsome in this bonnet. She stood before the transformation in the mirror almost in awe, and never heard what Miss Brower was saying:
    "That's just the thing for best, and there's a lovely lace wrap in the cloak department she ought to have to go with it. It would be charming."
    "Get it," said Donald with respectful brevity. He was astonished himself at the difference mere clothes made. Aunt Crete was fairly impressive in her new bonnet. And the lace wrap proved indeed to be the very mate to the bonnet, hiding the comfortable figure, and making her look "just like other people," as she breathlessly expressed it after one glance at herself in the lace wrap.
    They bought a plain black bonnet, a sweet little gray one, a fine silk umbrella, a lot of pretty belts and handkerchiefs, some shoes and rubbers, a hand-bag of cut steel, for which Luella would have bartered her conscience—what there was left of it; and then they smiled good-by at Miss Brower, and left her for a little while, and went to lunch.
    Such a lunch! S oup, and fish, and spring lamb, and fresh peas, and new potatoes, and two kinds of ice-cream in little hard sugar cases that looked like baked snow-balls. Aunt Crete's hand trembled as she took the first spoonful. The wonders of the day had been so great that she was fairly worn out, and two little bright red spots of excitement had appeared in her cheeks, but she was happy! Happier than she remembered ever to have been in her life before. Her dear old conscience had a moment of sighing that Luella could not have been there to have enjoyed it too, and then her heart bounded in wicked gleefulness that Luella was not there to stop her nice time.
    They went into a great hall in the same store, and sat among the palms and coolness made by electric fans, while a wonderful organ played exquisite music, and Aunt Crete felt she certainly was in heaven without the trouble of dying; and she never dreamed, dear soul, that she had been dying all her life that others might live, and that it is to such that the reward is promised.
    They went back to Miss Brower later; and behold! the silver-gray silk had been cut out, and was ready to fit. Aunt Crete felt it was fairy - work, the whole of it, and she touched the fabric as if it had been made by magic.
    Then they went and bought a trunk and a handsome leather satchel, and Donald took a notion that his aunt must have a set of silver combs for her hair such as he saw in the hair of another old lady .
    "Now," said Donald reflectively, "we'll go home and get rested, and to-morrow we'll come down and buy any things we've forgotten."
    "And I'm sure I don't see what more