Page:Elizabeth Jordan--Tales of the city room.djvu/48

 merely changed his theories regarding the ideal of feminine beauty, reconstructing them on the lines of the perfect realization daily resented to him. Thus, his sister, a "sales lady" in a Sixth Avenue shop, was surprised by an urgent request from her brother to wear her hair "parted down the middle and slicked on the sides," this being Chesterfield's description of Miss Neville's severely simple coiffure. His mother, a stout and matronly laundress of middle age, was startled by her precocious son's feverish desire to have her wear tailor-made gowns henceforth. He even brought her an assortment of collars and cuffs and a ready-made tie as a step in this direction, and was mildly surprised when the result was not an accurate copy of the graceful and elegant figure in "The Searchlight" office. A few rude jests at his expense checked Chesterfield's home missionary work, but in the office his eyes lingered more fondly than ever on the unconscious object of his soul's content. He attended to Miss Neville's few needs with a celerity that would have been startling in any other than Chesterfield. He listened with greedy ears to the praises of