The days and hours heaped in front of them
obliterated all possible view of the future.
In the beginning they had been as excited as he was over the thought of
the concert. He must wear a rosette--no, a flower in his button-hole;
and white kid gloves; as he moved forward upon the platform, he must
bow right and left, and draw them off as he bowed.
This was Jenny's idea. It was Jenny who made him practise his bows, and
it was Jenny who borrowed a dress-suit from a waiter-friend; while it
was his mother who "got up" the borrowed shirt to go with it, stiff and
shining; who polished his best boots until they looked "near as near
like patent."
All this had been done close upon a fortnight before. Jenny was a good
girl, but if she was not there to see to things, Jenny might fail with
a bubble on the shirt-front. No amount of meaning well was of any use
in getting up a stiff shirt as it ought to be got up.
"Better 'ave it all ready, 'a-case o' anything happening." That was
what Mrs. Cohen said to herself, with a dull dread at the back of her
mind: a feeling as though every next day were a Friday.
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