“Skirts? There is no such thing,” corrected Emma McChesney gently.
“Sausage-casing business, you mean.”
“Guess you're right, at that. By the way, how's that handsome youngster of yours? He's not traveling with you this trip?”
There came a wonderful glow into Emma McChesney's tired face.
“Jock's at college. Coming home for the holidays. We're going to have a dizzy week in New York. I'm wild to see if those three months of college have done anything to him, bless his heart! Oh, kind sir, forgive a mother's fond ravings! Where'd that youngster go with my bag?”
Up at last in the stuffy, unfriendly, steam-smelling hotel bedroom Emma McChesney prepared to make herself comfortable. A cocky bell-boy switched on the lights, adjusted a shade, straightened a curtain. Mrs. McChesney reached for her pocket-book.
“Just open that window, will you?”
“Pretty cold,” remonstrated the bell-boy. “Beginning to snow, too.”
“Can't help it. I'll shut it in a minute. The last man that had this room left a dead cigar around somewhere. Send up a waiter, please. I'm going to treat myself to dinner in my room.”
The boy gone, she unfastened her collar, loosened a shoe that had pressed a bit too tightly over the instep, took a kimono and toilette articles out of her bag.