"Goodness," she said, "ain't it comfortable--us all settin' here together, nobody's leg broke, nobody's house on fire, nor none of us dead?"
"'Us all settin' here together,'" Calliope repeated, suddenly grave amid our laughter, "that's part of what I'm comin' to. I wonder," she said to us, "how you folks have always thought of the City? Up till I went there to stay this while I always thought of it as--well, as the City an' not so much as folks at all. The City always meant to me big crowds on the streets--hurryin', hurryin', eatin', eatin', and not payin' much attention to anything. One whole batch of 'em I knew was poor an' lookin' in bakery windows. One whole batch of 'em I knew was rich an' sayin' there has to be these distinctions. And some more I knew was good--I always see 'em, like a pretty lady, stoopin' over, givin'. And some more I knew was wicked an' I always thought of them climbin' in windows. And then there was the little bit o' batch that knows the things I want to know an' talks like I'd like to talk an' that I'd wanted an' wanted to go up to the City an' get with.
"Well, then I went. An' the first thing, I see my relative wa'n't rich nor poor nor bad nor good nor--the way I mean. Nor her friends that come to see her, they wan't either. The ones I took for rich talked economy, an' the ones I thought was poor spent money, an' the good ones gossiped, an' they all jabbered about music and pictures that I thought you couldn't talk about unless you knew the 'way-inside-o'-things, like they didn't know. The kinds seemed all mixed up, and all of 'em far away an' formal, like--oh, like the books in a library when you can't think up one to draw out. I couldn't seem to get near to anything.
"Then one night I done what I'd always wanted to do. I took two dollars an' went to the theatre alone an' got me a seat. I put on the best I had, an' still I didn't feel like I was one of 'em, nor one of much of anybody. The folks on the car wasn't the way I meant, an' I felt mad at 'em for bein' differ'nt. There was a smilin' young fellow, all dressed black an' expensive, an' I thought: 'Put you side of Peter Cary an' there wouldn't be anybody there but Peter.' And when I got inside the theatre, it was just the same: one awful collection of dressed-up hair an' dressed-down backs an' everybody smilin' at somebody that wasn't me and all seemin' so sure of themselves. Specially the woman in front of me, but I guess it always is specially the woman in front of you. She was flammed out abundant. She had trimmin's in unexpected places, an' a good many colours took to do it, an' a cute little chatter to match. It come to me that she was more than different from me: she was the _otherest_ a person can be. An' I felt glad when the curtain went up.