her husband, hidden behind his barricade of newspaper. Her brow knotted
and her wide, uncorseted figure half rose toward him.

"Izzy, one night can't you stay at home and--"

"I ain't gone yet, am I, ma? Don't holler before you're hurt. There's a
fellow going to call for me at eight and we're going to a show--a good
fellow for me to know, Irving Shapiro, city salesman for the Empire
Waist Company. I ain't still in bibs, ma, that I got to be bossed where
I go nights."

"Ach, Izzy, for why can't you stay home this evening? Stay home and you
and Miriam and your friend sing songs together, and later I fix for you
some sandwiches--not, Izzy? A young man like Irving Shapiro I bet likes
it if you stay home with him once. Nice it will be for your sister,
too--eh, Izzy?"

Mrs. Binswanger's face, slightly sagging at the mouth from the ravages
of two recently extracted molars, broke into an invitational smile.

"Eh, Izzy?"

He found and withdrew his hat from behind a newspaper-rack and cast a
quick glance toward the form of his father, whose nether half, ending
in a pair of carpet slippers dangling free from his balbriggan heels,
protruded from the barricade of newspaper.

"That's right, just get the old man started on me, ma, too. When a
fellow travels six months out of the year in every two-by-four burg in
the Middle West, nagging like this is just what he needs when he gets