“Yes. In your skirt. Three plaits at the front-left, and three in the back. That's new, isn't it? If outer skirts are being made fuller, then it follows—”
“It ought to follow,” interrupted Emma McChesney, “but it doesn't. It lags way behind. These plaits are stitched down. See? That's the fiendishness of it. And the petticoat underneath—if there is one—must be just as smooth, and unwrinkled, and scant as ever. Don't let 'em fool you.”
Buck spread his palms with a little gesture of utter futility.
“I'm through. Out with your scheme. We're ready for it. It's our last card, whatever it is.”
There was visible on Emma McChesney's face that little tightening of the muscles, that narrowing of the eyelids which betokens intense earnestness; the gathering of all the forces before taking a momentous step. Then, as quickly, her face cleared. She shook her head with a little air of sudden decision.
“Not now. Just because it's our last card I want to be sure that I'm playing it well. I'll be ready for you to-morrow morning in my office. Come prepared for the jolt of your young life.”
For the first time since the beginning of the conversation a glow of new courage and hope lighted up T. A. Buck's good-looking features. His fine eyes rested admiringly upon Emma McChesney standing there by the great show-case. She seemed to radiate energy, alertness, confidence.
“When you begin to talk like that,” he said, “I always feel as though I could take hold in a way to make those famous jobs that Hercules tackled look like little Willie's chores after school.”
“Fine!” beamed Emma McChesney. “Just store that up, will you? And don't let it filter out at your finger-tips when I begin to talk to-morrow.”
“We'll have lunch together, eh? And talk it over then sociably.”