er you went wrong, dearie."

"Oh, I'm not getting soft. I saw my bed and made it, nice and soft and
comfy, and I'm lying on it without a whimper."

"You just bet your life you made it up nice and comfy! You've the right
idea; I have to hand that to you. You command respect from them. Lord!
Ed would as soon fire a teacup at me as not. But, with me, it pays. The
last one he broke he made up to me with my opal-and-diamond beetle."

"Wouldn't wear an opal if it was set next to the Hope diamond."

"Superstitious, dearie?"

"Unlucky. Never knew it to fail."

"Not a superstition in my bones. I don't believe in walking under
ladders or opening an umbrella in the house or sitting down with
thirteen, but, Lordy! never saw the like with you! Thought you'd have
the hysterics over that little old vanity mirror you broke that day out
at the races."

"Br-r-r! I hated it."

"Lay easy, dearie. Nothing can touch you the way he's raking in the war
contracts."

"Great--isn't it?"

"Play for a country home, dearie. I always say real estate and jewelry
are something in the hand. Look ahead in this game, I always say."

"You just bet I've looked ahead."

"So have I, but not enough."

"Somehow, I never feel afraid. I could get a job to-morrow if I had to."

"Say, dearie, if it comes to that, with twenty pounds off me, there's
not a chorus I couldn't land back in."

"I worked once, you know, in Lichtig's import shop."

"Fifth Avenue?"

"Yes. It was in between the salesman and Al. I sold two thousand five
hundred dollars' worth of gowns the first week."

"Sure enough?"

"'Girl,' old man Lichtig said to me the day I quit--'girl,' he said, 'if
ever you need this job again, comeback; it's waiting.'"

"Fine chance!"

"I've got the last twenty-five dollars I earned pinned away this minute
in the pocket of the little dark-blue suit I wore to work. I paid for
that suit with my first month's savings. A little dark-blue Norfolk,
Lichtig let me have out of stock for twenty-seven fifty."

"Were they giving them away with a pound of tea?"

"Honest, Kitty, it was neat. Little white shirt waist, tan shoes, and
one of those slick little five-dollar sailors, and every cent paid out
of my salary. I could step into that outfit to-morrow, look the part,
and land back that job or any other. I had a way with the trade, even
back at Finley's."

"Here, hold my jewel bag, honey; I'm going to die of cold-cream
suffocation if she don't soo