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At ten or eleven in the morning you saw them issue forth, or you saw “little” manicures going in. One spoke of these as “little” not because of their size, which was normal, but in definition of their prices. There were “little” dressmakers as well, and “little” tailors. In special session they confided to one another the names or addresses of any of these who happened to be especially deft, or cheap, or modish.

“I’ve found a little tailor over on Fifty-fifth. I don’t want you to tell any one else about him. He’s wonderful. He’s making me a suit that looks exactly like the model Hexter’s got this year and guess what he’s charging!” The guess was, of course, always a triumph for the discoverer of the little tailor.

The great lake dimpled or roared not twenty feet away. The park offered shade and quiet. The broad veranda invited one with its ample armchairs. You would have thought that peace and comfort had come at last to this shrewd, knowledgeous, hard-worked woman of sixty. She was handsomer than she had been at twenty or thirty. The white powdering her black hair softened her face, lightened her sallow skin, gave a finer lustre to her dark eyes. She used a good powder and had an occasional facial massage. Her figure, though full, was erect, firm, neat. Around her throat she wore an inch-wide band of black velvet that becomingly hid the chords and sagging chin muscles.

Yet now, if ever in her life, Hannah Winter was a slave.

Every morning at eight o’clock Marcia telephoned her mother. The hotel calls cost ten cents, but Marcia’s was an unlimited phone. The conversation would start with a formula.

“Hello–Mama?… How are you?”

“Fine.”

“Sleep all right?”

“Oh, yes. I never sleep all night through any more.”

“Oh, you probably just think you don’t…. Are you doing anything special this morning?”

“Well, I—-Why?”

“Nothing. I just wondered if you’d mind taking Joan to the dentist’s. Her brace came off again this morning at breakfast. I don’t see how I can take her because Elsie’s giving that luncheon at one, you know, and the man’s coming about upholstering that big chair at ten. I’d call up and try to get out of the luncheon, but I’ve promised, and there’s bridge afterward and it’s too late now for Elsie to get a fourth. Besides, I did that to her once before and she was furious. Of course, if you can’t … But I thought if you haven’t anything to do, really, why—-“

Through Hannah Winter’s mind would flash the events of the day as she had planned it. She had meant to go downtown shopping that morning. Nothing special. Some business at the bank. Mandel’s had advertised a sale of foulards. She hated foulards with their ugly sprawling patterns. A nice, elderly sort of material. Marcia was always urging her to get one. Hannah knew she never would. She liked the shops in their spring vividness. She had a shrewd eye for a bargain. A bite of lunch somewhere; then she had planned to drop in at that lecture at the Woman’s Club. It was by the man who wrote “Your Town.” He was said to be very lively and insulting. She would be home by five, running in to see the children for a minute before going to her hotel to rest before dinner.

A selfish day, perhaps. But forty years of unselfish ones had paid for it. Well. Shopping with nine-year-old Joan was out of the question. So, too, was the lecture. After the dentist had mended the brace Joan would have to be brought home for her lunch. Peter would be there, too. It was Easter vacation time. Hannah probably would lunch with them, in Marcia’s absence, nagging them a little about their spinach and chop and apple sauce. She hated to see the two children at table alone, though Marcia said that was nonsense.