"Maybe you can stop pouting long enough to help with things a little, even if you won't be here. I tell you it's a pleasure when papa comes home for supper with company, to have children like mine."

"Listen, mamma. I--"

"Sounds like somebody's going out of the house, Renie. Who--"

"No, no. No one has been here, mamma. It's just the breeze."

"I tell you it's a pleasure to have a daughter like mine! What excuses to make to Max Hochenheimer, a young man what comes all the way from Cincinnati to see her--"

"Listen, mamma; I--I've only been fooling--honest, I have."

"What?"

"I--aw, mamma."

Miss Shongut's face was suddenly buried in the neat lace yoke of her mother's dimity blouse, and her arms crept up about her neck.

"I've been only fooling about to-night, mamma. Don't you think I know it is just like he was sent from heaven? I've only been fooling, mamma, so that--so that you shouldn't know how happy I am."

The soul peeped out suddenly in Mrs. Shongut's face, hallowing it.

"Renie! My little Renie!"

On Wa.s.serman Avenue the hand that rocks the cradle oftener than not carves the roast. Behind her platter, sovereign of all she surveyed, and skilfully, so that beneath her steel the red, oozing slices curled and fell into their pool of gravy, reigned Mrs. Shongut. And her suzerainty rested on her as lightly as a tiara of seven stars.

"Mr. Hochenheimer, you ain't eating a thing!" Mrs. Shongut craned her neck round the centerpiece of pink carnations. "Not a thing on your plate! Renie, pa.s.s Mr. Hochenheimer some more salad."

"No, no, Mrs. Shongut; just don't you worry about me."

"I hope you ain't bashful, Mr. Hochenheimer. We feel toward you just like home folks."

"Indeed, what I don't see I ask for, Mrs. Shongut."

"Renie, pa.s.s Mr. Hochenheimer some more of that red cabbage."

"No, no--please, Mrs. Shongut; I got plenty."

"Ach, Mr. Hochenheimer, you eat so little you must be in love."

"Mamma!"

"Ach, Mr. Hochenheimer knows that I only fool. Renie, pa.s.s the dumplings."

"No, no--please! I--"

"Mamma, don't force. You're not bashful, are you, Mr. Hochenheimer?"

Miss Shongut inclined her head with a saucy, birdlike motion, and showed him the full gleaming line of her teeth. He took a large mouthful of ice-water to wash down the red of confusion that suddenly swam high in his face, tingeing even his ears.

"For more dumplings I ain't bashful, Miss Renie; but there--there's other things--I am bashful to ask for."

From his place at the far end of the table Mr. Shongut laughed deep, as though a spiral spring was vibrating in the recesses of his throat.

"Bashful with the girls--eh, Hochenheimer?"

"I ain't much of a lady's man, Shongut."

"Well, I wish you was just so bashful in business--believe me! I wish you was."

"Shongut, I never got the best of you yet in a deal."

"With my girl he's bashful yet, mamma; but down to the last sausage-casing I have to pay his fancy prices. Nun, look mamma, how red she gets! What you get so red for, Renie--eh?"

"Aw, papa!"

"A little teasing from her old father she can't take. Look at her, mamma! Look at both of them--red like beets. Neither of them can stand a little teasing from an old man."

"Adolph, you mustn't! All people don't like it when you make fun. Mr.

Hochenheimer, you must excuse my husband; a great one he is to tease and make his little fun."

Mr. Shongut's ancient-looking face, covered with a short, grizzled growth of beard and pale as a prophet's beneath, broke into a smile, and a minute network of lines sprang out from the corners of his eyes.

"I was bashful in my life once, too--eh, mamma?"

"Papa!"

"Please, you must excuse my husband, Mr. Hochenheimer; he likes to have his little jokes."

Mr. Hochenheimer pushed away his plate in high embarra.s.sment; nor would his eyes meet Miss Shongut's, except to flash away under cover of exaggerated imperturbability.

"My husband's a great one to tease, Mr. Hochenheimer. My Izzy too, takes after him. I'm sorry that boy ain't home, so you could meet him again.

We call him the dude of the family. Renie, pa.s.s Mr. Hochenheimer the toothpicks."

A pair of deep-lined brackets sprang out round Mr. Shongut's mouth. "Why ain't that boy home for supper, where he belongs?"

"Ach, now, Adolph, don't get excited right away. Always, Mr.

Hochenheimer, my husband gets excited over nothing, when he knows how it hurts his heart. Like that boy ain't old enough to stay out to supper when he wants, Adolph! 'Sh-h-h!"

Mrs. Shongut smiled to conceal that her heart was faint, and the saga of a mother might have been written round that smile.

"Now, now, Adolph, don't you begin to worry."

"I tell you, Shongut, it's a mistake to worry. I save all my excitement for the good things in life."

"See, Adolph; from a young man like Mr. Hochenheimer you can get pointers."

"I tell you, Shongut, over such a nice little home and such a nice little family as you got I might get excited; but over the little things that don't count for much I 'ain't got time."