I never saw a woman buy as little as you do, and you always manage to look well dressed." She smiled with faint irony.

Her clothes were dowdy, for she had turned the broadcloth dress she had had at her marriage and was wearing it in the street; but if he thought her well dressed, it seemed hardly fair to undeceive him.

Had she been any other woman, she reflected, he would probably have looked at her long enough to discover that she had grown decidedly shabby.
Since the baby's birth, as she told him, she had stopped calling with her mother-in-law, and a black net dress, given her by Mrs.Fowler because it had grown too small in the waist, was still presentable enough for the family dinners.

But she never worried about her appearance, and it was a relief to find that George was quite as indifferent on the subject as she was.

In the days of their honeymoon he had been so particular that she had spent hours each day before the mirror.
"Will you let me have the money, George ?" she asked again.