Most a month; they was well off, you know; I mean, they was, before the war. It was a nice house. JANE (_sewing_) How nice? BEN (_hesitates_) I don’t know, things--well--useful, you know, but nice, not like this. [_He looks about._ JANE (_looks around with a sigh_) It’s not very pretty, but it could be. I could make it. BEN If you did, folks would be sayin’ you wasn’t respectable. JANE Tell me about the dinner they gave you the night before you went back to your company. BEN I told you. JANE Tell me again. BEN (_smiles to himself at the remembrance_) They was all dressed up, the whole family, and there I was with just my dirty old uniform. JANE Yes. BEN (_lost in his recollections_) It was a fine dinner, but it wasn’t that. It was their doin’ so much for me, folks like that--I’ve sort of pictured ’em lots of times since then. JANE Go on. BEN All of the young ones laughing and happy, and the mother too, laughing and tryin’ to talk to me, and neither one of us knowing much about what the other one was sayin’. [_He and Jane both laugh._ JANE And the oldest daughter? The one that was most grown up? BEN She was scared of me somehow, but I don’t know as ever I’ve seen a girl like her, before or since. JANE Maybe ’twas that dress you told me about; seems to me you don’t remember much else about her; not so much as what color her hair was, only just that that dress was blue. BEN (_thoughtfully_) Yes. JANE (_sewing_) Sometimes you say dark blue! [_She is watching him closely through half-shut eyes._ BEN (_absently_) I guess so. JANE And then I say, dark as something I point out to you, that isn’t dark at all, and you say, “No, lighter than that!” BEN (_absently_) Just--sort of blue. JANE Yes, sort of blue. It had lace on it, too, didn’t it? BEN Lace? Maybe--yes, lace. JANE There’s more than one blue dress in the world. BEN Like enough. Maybe there’s mor’n one family like that lady’s, but I’ll be damned if they live in Veazie. (_He crosses and opens cupboard and selects a bottle_) I might as well run out and see how the old mare is getting on. [_He selects bottle from shelf._ JANE And you’ve got to shovel those paths for the clothes lines yet. BEN I know. JANE Well, don’t forget. BEN It ain’t likely you’ll let me.