Olive Higgins Prouty

“ Laurel spent many hours in the trolley-cars in Boston. Her mother decided it was too late in the year to attempt to place her in any private school (of course public schools were no more to be considered in Boston than in Milhampton) , but Mr. Hinckly said Boston was full of splendid institutions that specialized in about every subject that existed, and he could arrange for Laurel to take up courses of instruction in almost any of them.
Therefore Laurel traveled from one side of Boston to another, pursuing music in one building, French and German in another. Art in a third. ”

“ A housekeeping apartment. Lollie is just crazy to have a home of our own, so she can 'entertain,' and I guess it's high time. Mercy, I just wish I'd had sense enough to get out of Milhampton before. The town has always had it in for Laurel and me, ever since Stephen cleared out."
Stella didn't know anything about apartments in Boston. She didn't know anything about where "the right place was to live," nor "whom the right people were to know," nor which was the "right church," nor the "right school." Her knowledge of Boston was confined to the shopping district. ”

“ As she lay with her face buried in the dark of the pillow, she could see great masses of red and purple light-dust, shapeless and conglomerate, rolling and shifting senselessly in the dark behind her closed lids. ”

“ But when she told her mother about the conversation, Stella had exclaimed, "Heavens, we can't know those people, Laurel. They're foreigners! So is the family above us. I've discovered this place is riddled with them. Mr. Hinckly couldn't have known what he was talking about! We've simply got to get out sooner or later."
Until Stella moved to Boston, Laurel had preferred a tramp in the country, or a call on Jake, or Tony, or peg-legged Eddy, to the movies ”