“The topic for to-day’s discussion will be ‘Currency Problems of the Present Day,’” observed the president, after the club had come to order, “and I hope you are all prepared—”
“There is only one currency problem in the present day—to my knowledge, at least,” broke in the girl with the classic profile, “and that is: how to make two dollars do the work of ten.”
“Dear me, there is something actually masculine in your flippancy,” said the president, with ferocious gentleness. “The question before us is one of the deepest gravity, and—”
“Nobody knows that better than myself,” said the girl with the classic profile, “don’t I lie awake night after night, wondering how to get my new things out of the money my father has allowed me for the purpose, or, better yet, how to coax more out of him without letting him realize the fact.”
“Don’t talk about money, please; it makes me blue,” wailed the girl with the dimple in her chin. “What with never having enough for myself and constantly seeing other people with more than I like them to have, I—”
“What I want to know is—and you ought to be able to tell me, girls—why a woman who looks all sweetness and gentleness should suddenly develop into a raging lioness, just because her own son wants to marry some nice girl,” sighed the girl with the eyeglasses, waking suddenly out of a reverie.
“Humph,” returned the blue-eyed girl, “there are some things I don’t quite understand myself—such as the banking system, and the reason why your dressmaker tells you calmly that she must have two yards and a half more of your dress material, when you have plainly informed her that you bought a remnant. But as for your question, it is so simple that a man could answer it. No woman ever did, or ever will, like to play second fiddle to another one, and—”
“Oh, nonsense,” said the girl with the Roman nose, “it is just a question of tact. Let a man make his mother believe that she has chosen his wife and she—”
“Yes, and wouldn’t it be pleasant to have your mother-in-law tell you, every time she wanted you to discharge the cook or do without a new gown, that her son would never have married you but for her!” cried the girl with the dimple in her chin.
“Speaking of mothers-in-law,” said the girl with the classic profile, “Nell is to have a new woman in that capacity. I found her crying the other day because she had heard that Madame considered her too domestic to make her son a good wife!”