“Aren’t you going to the Settlement opening on Thursday?”

“Can’t get away from the bookstore in time.  Saturday’s a short day,” said Hen, her eyes on space....  “Look around you, Cally.  You’ll see lots more women than you who’re sick of parties.  I tell you this is the most interesting time to be alive in that ever was.”

Cally smiled wearily at these enthusiasms.  Nevertheless she could by now understand at least what Hen supposed she was talking about.  It was as if the cataclysm in the May-time had chipped a peep-hole in the embracing sphere of her girlhood’s round, and through this hole she began to discern novel proceedings afoot....

Strange talk was in the air of the old town in those days, strange things heard and seen.  Not a few women of the happy classes had grown “sick of parties.”  They grew sick of years lived without serious purpose, waiting for husband and children which sometimes never came; sick of their dependence, of their idleness, of their careful segregation from the currents of life about them.  They wearied, in short, of their position of inferior human worth, which some perceived, and others began dimly to suspect, under that glittering cover of fictions which looked so wholly noble till you stopped to think (which women should never do), and dared to glance sidewise at the seams underneath.  And now lately some high-hearted spirits had begun to voice their sickness, courageously braving those penalties which society so well knows how to visit upon those who disturb the accepted prejudices; penalties, it might be, peculiarly trying to women, over which some of these supposedly masculated pioneers doubtless had more than one good cry in secret.

What could be more interesting than the revolt of woman against “chivalry” in chivalry’s old home and seat?  That curious phenomenon was going on in Cally’s town now, though acuter social critics than she had quite failed to discover it....

Far rumors of her sex’s strange activities reached Cally, and she listened, but with apathy.  She marvelled at the freshness of interest with which Mattie and Evey McVey were preparing for the light routine which by now they knew like an old shoe.  But her own mood was nothing more forceful than meaningless restlessness and discontent.  Not even the unlooked-for arrival, one morning, of the dividend from the bank stock her father had given her in May, all her own, afforded her more than a flicker of the familiar joys.  How employ fifteen hundred dollars so that it would bring her happiness now?  Cally, after listless deliberation, took her wealth to her father that afternoon, offering it as a contribution toward mamma’s Settlement donation.  Her impulse was hardly sheer magnanimity; still, it was known that finance was a distinctly live issue in the House just now.

However, papa, after staring at her a moment, merely gathered her into his arms, check and all, remarking that she was a goose; and when she tried to argue about it a little, he ruled the situation with a strong paternal hand.  She was to buy herself pretties with that money, he said; and there, there, he didn’t want to hear any more foolishness about it.  No more Alphonse and Gaspard, as the fellow said....