MRS. SCHUMP (stooped for an infinitesimal stab of needle): She don't give 'em a chance, Cora. You can't tell me there is not many a nice, sober young man wouldn't be glad to sit out a Saturday evening with her. She's that bashful she don't give 'em a chance. I tell her it's almost as much ruination to a girl to be too retiring as to be too forward. She don't seem to have a way with the boys.
MISS SCHUMP (in a pink, warm-looking flannelette kimono and brushing out into fine fluff her flaxen-looking hair, and then, in the name of to-morrow's kink, plaiting it into a multitude of small, tight-looking braids): You can talk, mamma. You, too, Cora, with a boy like Archie Sensenbrenner and your wedding-day in sight. But what's a girl goin' to do if she don't take; if she ain't got an Archie?
Mrs. Schump (riding her glasses down toward the end of her nose to look up sharply over them): Get one.
"There you go again! Honest, you two make me mad. I can't go out and lasso 'em, can I?"
"She doesn't give 'em a chance, Cora; mark my word! The trouble is, she's too good for most she sees. They ain't up to her."
"I can't understand it, Mrs. Schump. I always say there ain't a finer girl on the floor than Stella. When I see other girls, most of 'em fresh little rag-timers that ain't worth powder and shot, bringing down the finest kind of fellows, and Stella never asked out or nothing, I always say to myself, 'I can't understand it.' Take me—what Arch Sensenbrenner ever seen in me, with Stella and her complexion working in the same department—"
"You got a way, Cora. There's just something about me don't take with the boys. Honest, if I could only see one of you girls alone with a fellow once, to see how you do it!"
"Just listen to her, Mrs. Schump, with her eyes and complexion and all!"
"There's not a reason my girl shouldn't have it as good and better than the best of them. She's a good girl, Cora. Stella's a good girl to me."
"Aw, mamma—"