She "madly, furiously" longs for a black dress with "wide sleeves embroidered in vivid colours – red, green, blue purple." To her, this dress is a totem of the ideal life, always just beyond reach. "If I could get it everything would be different," she predicts at one point. "I must go and buy a hat this afternoon, and tomorrow a dress," she thinks at another. "I must get on with the transformation act."
