Mrs. Shongut smiled to conceal that her heart was faint, and the saga of a mother might have been written round that smile.
"Now, now, Adolph, don't you begin to worry."
"I tell you, Shongut, it's a mistake to worry. I save all my excitement for the good things in life."
"See, Adolph; from a young man like Mr. Hochenheimer you can get pointers."
"I tell you, Shongut, over such a nice little home and such a nice little family as you got I might get excited; but over the little things that don't count for much I 'ain't got time."
Mrs. Shongut waved a deprecatory hand. "It's a nice enough little home for us, Mr. Hochenheimer, but with a grand house like I hear you built for your mother up on the stylish hilltop in Cincinnati, I guess to you it seems right plain."
"That's where you're wrong, Mrs. Shongut. Like I says to Shongut coming out on the street-car with him to-night, if it hadn't been that I thought maybe my mother would like a little fanciness after a hard life like hers, for my own part a little house and a big garden is all I ask for."
"Ach, Mr. Hochenheimer, with such a grand house like that is—sunk-in baths Mrs. Schwartz says you got! To see a house like that, I tell you it must be a treat."
"It's a fine place, Mrs. Shongut, but too big for me and my mother. When I got into the hands of architects, let me tell you, I feel I was lucky to get off with only twenty-five rooms. Right now, Mrs. Shongut, we got rooms we don't know how to pronounce."
"Twenty-five rooms! Did you hear that, Adolph? Twenty-five rooms! I bet, Mr. Hochenheimer, your mother is proud of such a son as can give her twenty-five rooms."