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moment when the question would be put. It was
something of a jolt when her mother, instead of the usual meek hint
on the subject, came briskly out with, “Ed, I think you ought to go
into town this morning instead of next week. Ellie’s got a few
little things to get at the dry-goods, so she can go with you. I
already gave her some of the egg money for it, so there’s no need
for you to bother about that.”
    Ed could be handled when taken unawares. He
looked up with an annoyed frown, but it took him a minute or so to
come up with an answer, with a mouthful of coffee assisting in the
delay. “Why today? I got haying to start soon; I dunno why I should
drive those horses all the way into town and back another
time.”
    “It isn’t another time if you don’t
have to go next week,” Mrs. Strickland pointed out sensibly.
    “What’s she got to get at the dry-goods
anyway? I was there last time; why couldn’t I have gotten it
then?”
    Ellie longed to say “Because you wouldn’t
have gotten it for me anyway,” but she did not dare to risk
sidetracking a conversation where her mother was holding the field
so well, and so held her peace.
    “Now, Ed, do you suppose your sister’s going
to trust you to pick out the right sorts of stockings and things
for her? Besides, I don’t think you’d want to. Better let Ellie
go.”
    Ed grumbled unintelligibly for another minute
or two, but the element of surprise was an effective weapon in that
it left him without his usual pre-prepared excuses. Before Ellie
had gotten over her own surprise and amusement at her mother’s
small victory, he had left the table and went out to harness the
team, and scarcely had the screen door swung closed behind him than
her mother was hurrying her out of her own chair to get her hat and
the little purse that held the precious money for the fabric. And
in less than half an hour they were on their way.
     

     
    There were indeed shelves of pretty fabrics
in the dry-goods store, but Ellie knew the one she wanted almost as
soon as she saw it. It was a pale pink lawn, with a whisper-fine
print of tiny starry flowers in white. Cautiously she inquired the
price…and felt again that little inner leap of excitement when it
proved to be within her means. Still hardly able to believe that
she, Ellie Strickland, was doing all these very ordinary but
somehow incredible things, she paid for it and for a pair of silk
stockings she had selected. The shoes, she had determined after
conferring with the storekeeper, were to be mail-ordered from the
Montgomery Ward catalogue. She filled out the order blank and
counted out the money there at the counter, and took it to the post
office to mail it before meeting Ed back at the wagon.
    That night as soon as supper was cleared away
they began work on the dress. Mrs. Strickland had always been a
fine seamstress, though it had been a long time since she had had
the chance to work on such pretty and delicate material. Armed with
a copy of McCall’s that was only a few months old, over
which she and Ellie pored with great attention, and assisted by
Ellie’s descriptions of the styles the other girls were wearing,
she cut out a pattern of her own. Evenings for the next two weeks
were a busy time, as mother and daughter cut, basted, stitched,
hemmed, gathered and fitted, with occasional breaks to tap, jiggle
and otherwise encourage the old sewing machine, long past the age
of retirement but still gamely trundling along.
    “I hope I ordered the right size,” said Ellie
for the twentieth time, lingering again over the page of shoes in
the Montgomery Ward catalogue. “If they’re a little tight I can
manage, but if they’re too big I just can’t dance in them.”
    “We’ll wedge them with newspaper,” said Mrs.
Strickland, who had certainly acquired new qualities of positivity
over this project, “or find some other way. You’ve spent too much
money and took too much trouble over all this to have it spoiled by
a