“Certainly.”
“Then I won’t take any money, thank you. I want to take this check home and show it to Daddy. He’ll be so pleased and proud! I know he’ll keep it as a souvenir, and then he’ll give me some of his money for the hat!”
THE DRESSMAKER IN THE HOUSE
SCENE.—A sewing-room, with the usual piles of unfinished or unmended clothing heaped on tables and chairs. Mrs. Lester, a pretty, fussy little woman, is trying on her own gowns and then tossing them aside, one after another.
Enter Miss Cotton, a visiting dressmaker.
Mrs. Lester: Oh, Miss Cotton, I’m so glad you’ve come! I’m nearly frantic. Excuse the looks of this sewing-room. I don’t see why a sewing-room never can keep itself cleared up! I suppose it’s because they never have any closets in them; or if they do, you have to hang your best dresses there—there’s no other place. And so this room gets simply jammed with white work and mending and hats, and I don’t know what all! My husband says it’s like the Roman Forum done in dry-goods. But he’s a regular Miss Nancy about neatness and order. Now, to-day, Miss Cotton, we’re going to do sleeves. See? Sleeves! And nothing else. I’m simply driven crazy by them.
Oh, don’t look as if you didn’t know what I meant! You know, all my gowns have elbow sleeves, and I must either have long ones put in or throw the whole dress away.
Yes, I know I said I’d wear the short sleeves, if other people did insist on having long ones. I know I said I’d be independent, and at least wear out the ones I have. But I’m conquered! I admit it! It isn’t any fun to go to a luncheon and be the only woman at the table with elbow sleeves!
Yesterday I went to Mrs. Ritchie’s Bridge, and my partner, that big Mrs. Van Winkle, with chains of scarabs all over her chest till she looked like the British Museum, kept pulling her long sleeves down farther over her knuckles just to annoy me.