"Well, I'm doing it, ain't I?"

"Now, Miriam, you and Izzy go in the parlor and sing for mamma a
little."

Miriam's small teeth met in a small click, her voice lay under careful
control and as if each nerve was twanging like a plucked violin string.

"Please, mamma, please! I just can't sing to-night!"

She was like a Jacque rose, dark and swaying, her little bosom beneath
the sheer blouse rising higher than its wont.

"Please, mamma!"

"Ach, now, Miriam!"

"Where's those steamship pamphlets, mamma, I left laying here on the
table?"

"Right here where you left them, Miriam."

Mr. Isadore Binswanger executed a two-stride dash for the couch,
plunging into a nest of pillows and piling them high about his head and
ears.

"Go-od night! The subject of Europe is again on the table for the
seventh evening this week. Nix for mine! Good night! Good night!" And he
fell to burrowing his head deeper among the pillows.