A rather grim snort here from Charley who was leaping up the stairs after her aunt, like a handsome young colt. Lottie's room was at the rear of the second floor looking out upon the back yard. A drear enough plot of ground now, black with a winter's dregs of snow and ice. In the spring and summer Lottie and Great-aunt Charlotte coaxed it into a riot of colour that defied even the South Side pall of factory smoke and Illinois Central cinders. A border of old-fashioned flowers ran along either side of the high board fence. There were daisies and marigolds, phlox and four-o'clocks, mignonette and verbenas, all polka-dotted with soot but defiantly lovely. On her way up the stairs, Lottie had been unfastening coat and skirt with quick, sure fingers. She tossed the despised hat on the bed. Now, as Charley entered, her aunt stepped out of the suit skirt and stood in her knickers, a trim, well set-up figure, neatly articulated, hips flat and well back; bust low and firm; legs sturdy and serviceable, the calf high and not too prominent. She picked up the skirt, opened her closet door, snatched another skirt from the hook. Mrs. Payson's voice from the foot of the stairway. "Lottie, put on a dress--the blue silk one. Ben Gartz is coming over. He telephoned." "Oh _dear_!" said Lottie; hung the skirt again on its hook; took out the blue silk. "Do you mean," demanded Charley, "that Grandma made an engagement for you without your permission?" (You ought to hear Charley on the subject of personal freedom). "Oh, well--Ben Gartz. He and mother talk real estate, or business." "But he comes to see you." Charley had swung herself up to the footboard of the old walnut bed that Lottie herself had cream-enamelled. A slim, pliant young thing, this Charley, in her straight dark blue frock. She was so misleadingly pink and white and golden that you neglected to notice the fine brow, the chin squarish in spite of its soft curves, the rather deep-set eyes. From her perch Charley's long brown-silk legs swung friendlily. You saw that her stockings were rolled neatly and expertly just below knees as bare and hardy as a Highlander's. She eyed her aunt critically. "Why in the world do you wear corsets, Lotta?" (This "Lotta" was a form of affectation and affection.) "Keep the ol' tum in, of course. I'm no lithe young gazelle like you." "Gained a little, haven't you--this winter?" "I'm afraid I have." Lottie was stepping into the blue silk and dancing up and down as she pulled it on to keep from treading on it. "I don't get enough exercise, that's the trouble. That darned old electric!" Charley faced her sternly from the footboard. "Well, if you will insist on being the Family Sacrifice. Making a 'bus line of yourself between here and the market--the market and the park--the park and our house. The city ought to make you pay for a franchise." "Now--Charley----"