Ton boasted a broken finger nail or that little brash place along the
forefinger that tattles so of potato peeling or asparagus scraping.

The fourteenth-story manicure, steam bath, and beauty parlors saw to
all that. In spite of long bridge table, lobby divan, and table-d'hôte
séances, "tea" where the coffee was served with whipped cream and the
tarts built in four tiers and mortared in mocha filling, the Bon Ton
hotel was scarcely more than an average of fourteen pounds overweight.

Forty's silhouette, except for that cruel and irrefutable place where
the throat will wattle, was almost interchangeable with eighteen's.
Indeed, Bon Ton grandmothers with backs and French heels that were
twenty years younger than their throats and bunions, vied with twenty's
profile.

Whistler's kind of mother, full of sweet years that were richer because
she had dwelt in them, but whose eyelids were a little weary, had no
place there.

Mrs. Gronauer, who occupied an outside, southern-exposure suite of
five rooms and three baths, jazzed on the same cabaret floor with her
granddaughters.

Many the Bon Ton afternoon devoted entirely to the possible lack
of length of the new season's skirts or the intricacies of the new
filet-lace patterns.

Fads for the latest personal accoutrements gripped the Bon Ton in
seasonal epidemics.