the manicure shop just as
debonair and cozy as though they'd been born and raised there, swapping
the ready repartee of the day with dashing creatures of a frequently
blonde aspect, and you imagine they have always done so. You little know
that these persons who are now appearing so much at home and who can
snap out those bright, witty things like "I gotcher Steve," and "Well,
see who's here?" without a moment's hesitation and without having to
stop and think for the right word or the right phrase but have it right
there on the tip of the tongue--you little reck that they too passed
through the same initiation which you now contemplate. Yet such is the
case.

You have dress rehearsals--private ones--in your room. In the seclusion
of your bed chamber you picture yourself opening the door of the marble
manicure hall and stepping in with a brisk yet graceful tread--like
James K. Hackett making an entrance in the first act--and glancing about
you casually--like John Drew counting up the house--and saying "Hello
girlies, how're all the little Heart's Delights this afternoon?" just
like that, and picking out the most sumptuous and attractive of the
flattered young ladies in waiting; and sinking easily into the chair
opposite her--see photos of William Faversham and throwing the coat
lapels back, at the same time resting the left hand clenched upon the
upper thigh with the elbow well out--Donald Brian asking a lady to
waltz--and offering the right hand to the favored female and telling her
to go as far as she likes with it. It sounds simple when you figuring it
out alone, but it rarely works out that way in practice. It is my belief
that every woman longs for the novelty of a Turkish bath and every man
for the novelty of a manicure long before either dares to tackle it.
I may be wrong but this is my belief. And in the case of the man he
usually makes a number of false starts.

You go to the portals and hesitate and then, stumbling across the
threshold, you either dive on through to the barber shop--if there is a
barber shop in connection--or else you mumble something about being in
a hurry and coming back again, and retreat with all the grace and ease
that would be shown by a hard shell crab that was trying to back into
the mouth of a milk-bottle. You are likely to do this several times;
but finally some day you stick. You slump down into one of those little
chairs and offer your hands or one of them to a calm and slightly