We made that mistake one morning two or three months ago. A fellow had given us a cheque—it was rather a surprise, we admit—and we were quite short of money, which is never a surprise to us. We needed it and we needed it quickly, so we were at the door of his bank just one minute and a half after it opened. We didn't want to give anyone else a chance to beat us to his bank-balance, so we were there at nine-thirty-six-and-a-half.
The young ladies were present all right—most of them, at any rate—but they had not yet turned their minds to the business of the day. About a dozen of them were gathered in chatty little groups, from which stray snatches of conversation reached our ears.
"I think I'd have frills on it, my dear," said one. "You know those net and muslin frills are all the rage. Gertie was over at Buffalo last week, and she said that the girls were wearing them all over."
How "all over?" But another broke in.
"Say, have you girls seen Maud's new Dew-Kist silk skirt?" she burbled. "It's just too sweet. But don't you think Dew-Kist is an awful nuisance?—everything sticks to it, you know. And it gets so fuzzy when it's rubbed."
Dew-Kist!—it certainly was a very pretty name. A Dew-Kist skirt suggested Arcadian gambols about the morning meadows, with singing and laughter and—well, there is no need of leaving all the kissing to the dew. But we decided not to rub one of those skirts—not if it was going to get all fuzzy and give us away like that. We even made a brief mental prayer that the vogue of Dew-Kist silk would be a short one, much as we liked the name.
Then we waited patiently for another five minutes, while the conversation turned lightly to chenille hats and knitted sweaters.
"I am doing mine in old-rose silk," one young lady informed the other girls and the banking public generally, as represented by us. "Wool is getting so common, don't you think? And the silk clings to the figure much better. You don't get that bulkiness around the waist."
Under the circumstances, we were strong for silk, and we were glad to think the girls were taking it up. In fact, we found the whole conversation very pleasant and improving. But we could not help reflecting that our financial purpose in visiting the bank was not being furthered by it, and that the Managing Editor might perhaps be impatient for our presence at the office. Of course, his humor would all depend on what sort of golf he had played the afternoon before, but one mustn't count too confidently on a good score.
So we coughed. We coughed gently at first, and then louder and louder, until finally we were tearing the fur lining out of our throat. A couple of fair bankeresses glanced at us as though we were an obnoxious June-bug. And then one of them—we think it was Claire—sauntered over to us humming one of Al Jolson's newest records. She laid a powder-puff on the desk and stretched a languid hand for our cheque. She read the cheque. She seemed to read it over several times. Then she laid it on the ledger and walked back to the group. An idea had evidently struck her—we thought she was going to call the police.