\nMiss Lily Perkins was sitting on the park bench after eating her lunch sandwitches. She was waiting for her friend Miss Alice Hollister, who was late. Sun was warming nicely on this summery morning. The year was 1926 and life was wonderful. Some time ago Lily met Miss Hollister’s cousin Peter and now she was waiting to hear some news from her friend. And there was Miss Hollister, hat tilted and droopy stockings, as usual.<\/p>\n
Alice sat down on the bench and passed a little parcel to Lily. With shiny eyes Miss Perkins looked at the parcel, because today was her 21st birthday. “Peter couldn’t come, but he sent you a gift” said Alice and took her hat off to fan her face with it. Hands shaking Lily opened the silk paper parcel and it literally made her eyes almost blind. It was little evening purse, embroidered with thousands of little shiny beads. You know, one of those fashionable bags, used by little bit outrageous, rebellious women who roll their stockings down, dance untill five in the morning, occasionally smoke cigarrette or two and if they go really wild they have a glass of whisky. That made Lily blush a bit.<\/p>\n
Alice reached to catch Lily’s hand and said with a smile: “You know, I think Peter is going to propose to you!” Miss Hollister opened her lunch box and quickly stuffed her face with her sandwitches and sipped some milk from the bottle. Lunch break didn’t last very long. She continued: ” Kent’s are having a huge party tomorrow and Peter wants you to come.” Miss Perkins made a little sigh of happiness and squeezed the purse against her chest: “I will come, of course. What time and what am I going to wear?” Miss Hollister swallowed last bit of bread and said: “Well, you can wear that mauve dress with beaded belt. That goes nicely with the purse. I will bring some flowers from our neighbours garden for your hair. I will pick you up at 6.30. We will meet Peter at Kents.”<\/p>\n
Lunch break went but that friday seemed to last ages. On Saturday after she got off work, Lily was like walking on hot coals. She only had one hour to eat, have a bath and get ready for the party. And when Alice knocked on her door she was just checking her fingerwaves. Miss Hollister was chatting cheerfully the whole trip to the Kent house but Lily was so nervous she could barely speak. Party had already started and open windows of the Kent house allowed the loud jazz music and peoples voices float to the streets nearby.<\/p>\n
House was full but Peter could not be found. Lily and Alice were trying to find out from friends if they knew something about Peter. No-one seemed to know anything. They hadn’t seen him since yesterday. Party continued to the early morning hours as usual, but Peter never showed up. Lily was absolutely stunned. She could not understand what had happened. Around three o’clock she gave up and asked Alice to walk her home. Alice was furious. How on earth could Peter do such thing to her best friend! When Lily got home she was completely numb. She just sat down on her sofa and stared at the beaded silver purse. And there she was still sitting and staring at the bag around ten in the morning when Miss Hollister came to check how her friend was doing. For a moment Lily cried against her best friends shoulder, then Alice helped her change into night gown and tucked her to bed. Then she wrapped the beaded purse back into the silk paper and took it to the attic storage where the pigeons live. There she hid it into the wooden trunk that was covered with layers and layers of dust.<\/p>\n
Miss Lily Perkins never saw Peter again, and even Alice didn’t knew what happened to him. Beaded shiny purse was forgotten into the trunk for decades. I got the bag from my hubbies sister couple years ago. She got if from her friend. Is the story true? Who knows! ;)<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n <\/p>\n![\"silverpurse5\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.evildressmaker.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/silverpurse5.jpg\")
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