Rebecca sat quite still, watching her sister as she proceeded to change her garments, taking from wardrobe and tiring chest her wide skirts, long-sleeved jacket, and striped under-vest with a promptitude and readiness that showed perfect familiarity with her surroundings.
"There," thought Rebecca, "I have it! She's been reading those old letters and looking at that ivory picture so long she thinks that she's the girl in the picture herself, now. Yes, that's it. Mary Burton was the name!"
When Phoebe was new-dressed, her sister could not but acknowledge inwardly that the queer clothes were mightily becoming. She appeared the beau ideal of a merry, light-hearted, healthy girl from the country.
On one point, however, Rebecca could not refrain from expostulating.
"Look a-here, Phoebe," she said, in a scandalized voice, as she rose and faced her sister, "ain't you goin' to put on somethin' over your chest? That ain't decent the way you've got yerself fixed now!"
"Nonsense!" cried Phoebe, with a mischievous twinkle in her eye. "Wouldst have me cover my breast like a married woman! Look to thine own attire. Come, where hast put it?"
Rebecca put her hands on her hips and looked into her sister's face with a stern determination.
"Ef you think I'm agoin' to put on play-actor clothes an' go round lookin' indecent, Phoebe Wise, why, you're mistaken--'cause I ain't--so there!"
"Nay, nurse!" Phoebe exclaimed, earnestly. "'Tis the costume thou art wearing now that is mummer's weeds. Come, sweet--come! They'll not yield thee admittance below else."
She concluded with a warning inflection, and shook her finger affectionately at her sister.
Rebecca opened her mouth several times and closed it again in despair ere she could find a reply. At length she seated herself slowly, folded her arms, and said:
"They can do jest whatever they please downstairs, Phoebe. As fer me, I'd sooner be seen in my nightgown than in the flighty, flitter-scatter duds the women 'round here wear. Not but you look good enough in 'em, if you'd cover your chest, but play-actin' is meant for young folks--not fer old maids like me."
"What the lands sakes d'ye holler neigh all the time fer? I'm not agoin' to neigh, an' you might's well make up your mind to't."