Loitering over coffee and toast, in the sunny dining-room, the morning wasted away.  The newspapers were idly discussed, various scraps of the house gossip went the rounds.  Many a time, before her entrance into the business world, Susan had known this pleasant idleness to continue until ten o’clock, until eleven o’clock, while the room, between the stove inside and the winter sunshine outside, grew warmer and warmer, and the bedrooms upstairs waited in every stage of appalling disorder and confusion.

Nowadays Susan ran downstairs just before eight o’clock, to gulp down her breakfast, with one eye on the clock.  The clatter of a cable car passing the corner meant that Susan had just time to pin on her hat, seize her gloves and her lunch, and catch the next cable-car.  She flashed through the dreary little entrance yard, past other yards, past the bakery, and took her seat on the dummy breathless with her hurry, exhilarated by the morning freshness of the air, and filled with happy expectation for the new day.

On the Monday morning that Mr. Peter Coleman made his appearance as a member of the Front Office staff, Susan Brown was the first girl to reach the office.  This was usually the case, but to-day Susan, realizing that the newcomer would probably be late, wished that she had the shred of an excuse to be late herself, to have an entrance, as it were.  Her plain suit had been well brushed, and the coat was embellished by a fresh, dainty collar and wide cuffs of white linen.  Susan had risen early to wash and press these, and they were very becoming to her fresh, unaffected beauty.  But they must, of course, be hung in the closet, and Susan, taking her place at her desk, looked quite as usual, except for the spray of heliotrope pinned against her lavender shirtwaist.

The other girls were earlier than was customary, there was much laughing and chatting as desks were dusted, and inkwells filled for the day.  Susan, watching soberly from her corner, saw that Miss Cottle was wearing her best hat, that Miss Murray had on the silk gown she usually saved for Saturdays, that Thorny’s hair was unusually crimped and puffed, and that the Kirks were wearing coquettish black silk aprons, with pink and blue bows.  Susan’s face began to burn.  Her hand unobtrusively stole to her heliotrope, which fell, a moment later, a crushed little fragrant lump, into her waste-basket.  Presently she went into the coat closet.

“Remind me to take these to the French Laundry at noon,” said Susan, pausing before Thorny’s desk, on her way back to her own, with a tight roll of linen in her hand.  “I left ’em on my coat from yesterday.  They’re filthy.”

“Sure, but why don’t you do ’em yourself, Susan, and save your two bits?”

“Well, maybe I will.  I usually do.”  Susan yawned.

“Still sleepy?”

“Dying for sleep.  I went with my cousin to St. Mary’s last night, to hear that Mission priest.  He’s a wonder.”