That they would submit tamely to the introduction of a young, pretty, and presumably dangerous member of their own sex was not to be supposed.

But whatever protest they made did not pass beyond their conjugal seclusion, and was apparently not supported by their husbands.
Two or three of them, under the pretext of sympathy of sex, secured interviews with the fair intruder, the result of which was not, however, generally known.

But a few days later Mrs."Bob" Carpenter--a somewhat brick-dusty blonde--was observed wearing some black netting and a heavily flounced skirt, and Mrs.Shuttleworth in her next visit to Fiddletown wore her Paisley shawl affixed to her chestnut hair by a bunch of dog-roses, and wrapped like a plaid around her waist.

The seven ladies of Buckeye, who had never before met, except on domestic errands to each other's houses or on Sunday attendance at the "First Methodist Church" at Fiddletown, now took to walking together, or in their husbands' company, along the upper bank of the river--the one boulevard of Buckeye.

The third day after Miss Mendez' arrival they felt the necessity of immediate shopping expeditions to Fiddletown.