by Henry James

“ Jordan shouldn’t; even though Mrs. Jordan, handed down from their early twilight of gentility and also the victim of reverses, was the only member of her circle in whom she recognised an equal. She was perfectly aware that her imaginative life was the life in which she spent most of her time; and she would have been ready, had it been at all worth while, to contend that, since her outward occupation didn’t kill it, it must be strong indeed. Combinations of flowers and green-stuff, forsooth! What she could handle freely, she said to herself, was combinations of men and women. ”

“ She was so absurdly constructed that these were literally the moments that made up—made up for the long stiffness of sitting there in the stocks, made up for the cunning hostility of Mr. Buckton and the importunate sympathy of the counter-clerk, made up for the daily deadly flourishy letter from Mr. Mudge, made up even for the most haunting of her worries, the rage at moments of not knowing how her mother did “get it.” ”

“ She had a friend who had invented a new career for women—that of being in and out of people’s houses to look after the flowers. Mrs. Jordan had a manner of her own of sounding this allusion; “the flowers,” on her lips, were, in fantastic places, in happy homes, as usual as the coals or the daily papers. ”