e out what you done with that match-safe ‘t used to stand behind the stuffed owl in the parlor” (Wharton 100). She is more concerned with getting everything from Mattie that she can then she is with the fact that she is throwing a member of her family who is unprepared for work out of her home with nowhere to go. This selfish nature reminds the reader that Zeena is a hateful woman. The red pickle dish that demonstrates Zeena’s selfishness also demonstrates Mattie’s role as a temptress to Ethan in the novel. She knows that Zeena would not want her to use the pickle dish but she brings it down despite the interests of her employer. She says “I had to get up on the step ladder to reach it…and of course she’ll know why I did it” (Wharton 62). Mattie says she just “wanted to make the supper table pretty” (Wharton 91). She chose the one night that Zeena would not be there to do it. When Ethan tells her there might be more snow on the way, she asks, “do you suppose it’ll interfere with Zeena’s getting back?” (Wharton 61). Mattie is enjoying her time alone with Ethan, trying to impress him with her beauty and homemaking skills, and she does not want his wife to interfere; this further illustrates Mattie’s role as a temptress to Ethan. Mattie’s physical description is the extreme opposite of Zeena’s; she is beautiful, young and vibrant. When Mattie and Ethan come home from the social, Zeena stands in the door waiting for them, and Ethan is struck by her hard features. The following night, when Zeena is out of town, Mattie greets Ethan at the door, in the same position Zeena met them the night before. Ethan says that the candle she held “drew out a distinctiveness in her slim, young throat and her brown wrist was no bigger than a child’s… the candle light threw a lustrous fleck on her lips, edged her eyes with velv...
