"I slipped and almost fell on the ice at the corner of twenty-ninth," Lottie retorted, laughingly, leaning over the balustrade.
"What earthly difference does that make!"
A rather grim snort here from Charley who was leaping up the stairs after her aunt, like a handsome young colt.
Lottie's room was at the rear of the second floor looking out upon the back yard. A drear enough plot of ground now, black with a winter's dregs of snow and ice. In the spring and summer Lottie and Great-aunt Charlotte coaxed it into a riot of colour that defied even the South Side pall of factory smoke and Illinois Central cinders. A border of old-fashioned flowers ran along either side of the high board fence. There were daisies and marigolds, phlox and four-o'clocks, mignonette and verbenas, all polka-dotted with soot but defiantly lovely.
On her way up the stairs, Lottie had been unfastening coat and skirt with quick, sure fingers. She tossed the despised hat on the bed. Now, as Charley entered, her aunt stepped out of the suit skirt and stood in her knickers, a trim, well set-up figure, neatly articulated, hips flat and well back; bust low and firm; legs sturdy and serviceable, the calf high and not too prominent. She picked up the skirt, opened her closet door, snatched another skirt from the hook.
Mrs. Payson's voice from the foot of the stairway. "Lottie, put on a dress—the blue silk one. Ben Gartz is coming over. He telephoned."
"Oh dear!" said Lottie; hung the skirt again on its hook; took out the blue silk.
"Do you mean," demanded Charley, "that Grandma made an engagement for you without your permission?" (You ought to hear Charley on the subject of personal freedom).
"Oh, well—Ben Gartz. He and mother talk real estate, or business."
"But he comes to see you."