To keep being different, revealing her beauty in new ways, to see if he'd notice, to laugh in his arms and feel her power over Joe, had brought back her old zest for pretty clothes, and she had been wearing all the things she had bought when she first came to town.
Last year's clothes, for they still smilingly called themselves "poor," although Joe was doing much better now.

Last year's clothes, and the styles had changed, but in ways which Joe, poor dear, was too blind to notice.
The room in which she was dressing had somehow assumed a different air.
Although in the main it was the same as when Amy had been here, and her picture was still on Joe's chiffonier--still subtly by degrees it had changed.

Some of Ethel's clothes were lying about, her work-bag and a book or two; the dressing table at which she was sitting had been covered in fresh chintz, and Ethel's things were on it.

Joe's picture and Susette's were here, and a droll little painted bird was perched above the mirror.
As she glanced into the glass, gaily she thanked herself for the charms which she was deftly enhancing--in the glossy black hair, smooth and sleek, in the flushed cheeks and the red of her lips and the gleaming lights in her brown eyes.

She nodded approvingly at herself.