"Ain't your cheeks cold, though, Jimmie? It's right sharp out, ain't it? And Essie in her thin coat! You--you're a little late to-night, ain't you, Jimmie?" He drew his loose-jointed figure up from over the bedside; and his features, half-formed as a sculptor's head just emerging from the marble, took on the easy petulance of youth, and he wiped the moist lips' print off his downy cheek with the back of his hand. "Ah, there you go again! You been layin' here frettin' and countin' the minutes again, ain't you? Gee, it makes a fellow sore when he just can't get home no sooner!" "No, no, Jimmie; I been layin' here sleepin' sound ever since I went to bed. I woke up for the first time just now. I'm all right, Jimmie, only--only--" "Honest, ma, you ought to ask the company to put me in short-pants uniform, day duty, carrying telegrams of the day's catechism to Sunday-school classes." "I--Don't fuss at me, Jimmie! I--I guess I must 'a' had one of them smothering spells, and I didn't wait up for Essie and Joe to-night. I'm all right now, Jimmie--all right." He placed his heavy hand on her brow in half-understanding sympathy. "Geewhillikins, why don't you tell a fellow? You want some of that black medicine, ma. You--gee!--you ain't lookin' kinda blue-like round the gills, are you? Old man Gibbs said we should send for him right away if--" "No, no, Jimmie; I'm all right now." "Look! I brought you a carnation one of the operators gimme--one swell little queen, too. You want some of that black medicine, ma?" "I'm all right now, Jimmie. It was just earlier in the evening I kinda had a spell. Ain't that pink pretty, though! Here, put it in the glass, and gimme a French kiss. Always ashamed like a big baby when it comes to kissin', ain't you? Ashamed to even kiss your old ma!" "Aw!" He shuffled his feet and bent over her, with the red mounting above the gold collar of his uniform. "And such a mamma-boy you used to be before you had to get out and hustle--such a mamma-boy, and now ashamed to give your old ma a kiss!" "Ashamed nothin'! Here, ma, I'll smooth your hair for you the wrong way like Essie used to do when you came home from the store dead after the semiannual clearings." "No, no, Jimmie; these days I ain't got no more hair left to smooth." "You look good to me." "Aw, Jimmie, quit stringing your old ma. How can a stack o' bones look good to anybody?" "You do." "Your papa used to say so, too, Jimmie; but in them days my hair was natural curly--little cute, springy curls like Essie's. The first day he seen me he fell for 'em; and the night before he died, Jimmie, with you and Essie asleep in your folding-cribs and me little thinkin' that the next week I'd be back in the department clerking again, he took me in his arms and--" "Yes, yes; I know, ma--but didn't old man Gibbs say not to get excited? Lay back and don't talk, ma. I can feel your heart beatin' way down in your hands."