Chapter 4 PRESSING DIFFICULTIES

After Jo Ann had finished talking to Lucile, Florence and Peggy asked together, "Is it a real party she's having? Will we have to dress up?"

"Yes, we'll have to wear dinner dresses, of course. We'll have to speed, too, if we're to be ready when she gets here."

"Oh, I'm afraid my blue crêpe'll be a mass of wrinkles," Peggy exclaimed as she hurried over and began unpacking her clothes.

"Get my dress-the pink taffeta-out, too," Jo Ann called out on her way to the bathroom. "It's in your suitcase. I'll have my bath in two jiffies and be in my dress in another one."

When she reappeared in the room a few minutes later, garbed in a negligee whose rose color matched her fresh glowing cheeks, she found that Miss Prudence and Carlitos had gone to the dining room and that Florence and Peggy were standing lamenting over the wrinkled state of their dinner dresses.

"Our dresses are terribly rumpled, and yours is the worst of the three," Peggy remarked with a worried frown. "I hate for us to disgrace Lucile by coming to her party looking like wrecks of the Hesperus."

"We won't have time to send them out to a pressing shop or even to the maid here in the hotel-we'd never get them back in time to wear," added Florence.

"Oh, stop worrying!" Jo Ann sang out, as she ran the comb through her curls. "I'll press all three dresses while you're getting your baths. You have a small electric iron in your bag, didn't you say, Florence?"

"Yes. It's really a toy that I'm taking as a present to one of the little girls in my neighborhood. The cord's so short-I doubt if you can use the iron."

"Get it out and I'll use it all right." Jo Ann's voice was confident.

When Florence handed the iron to her and she saw how short the cord was, she began to feel dubious, though her determination did not waver. She'd manage some way. After a hasty look about the room she saw there was only one usable light socket in the room-the high ceiling one above the bed.

"I'll have to attach the iron to that socket." She pointed to the ceiling light.

Florence looked at the diminutive cord and laughed. "You can't do it."

"If you'll hold me steady, you'll see." Jo Ann climbed up on the foot of the bed. "Hold my legs, now." She stood tiptoe on this perch and after many efforts succeeded in putting the plug into one of the center sockets.

That done, she stepped down on a newspaper on the bed, but to her disappointment she saw that the cord lacked at least four feet.

Peggy and Florence burst into giggles at the funny sight of Jo Ann holding the iron in midair.

"Stop giggling, sillies, and do something, quick. This iron's getting hot, and I'm getting tired holding it. Get that table over there and put it up here on the bed. Hurry!"

The two girls rushed over to the table, jerked off the water pitcher and glasses, and then carried it over and lifted it on top of the bed. The iron still hung at least two feet above the table.

"Oh gee!" wailed Jo Ann. "Get something else to put on top of the table. Step on it! Don't run around in circles like a puppy after its tail, Peg."

"Thanks for the beautiful comparison," Peggy grinned. "You're equally funny looking yourself, springing up and down on that bed every time you move."

"Can't help springing. It's the springiest bed in all Texas."

By that time Florence had brought over the low luggage stool and placed it on top of the table. But even with its added height there were several inches between it and the iron.

"There's nothing else to put on top of that-except the dresser," called out Peggy between giggles. "Oh yes, maybe the telephone book'll help." She ran over with it and several magazines and piled them on top of the luggage stand.

"Attaboy!" Jo Ann ejaculated triumphantly as she set the iron down on the magazines. "Now bring me something for an ironing-board cover and the dresses."

In a few more minutes she was ironing away energetically, swaying back and forth in her efforts to keep her balance on the springy bed. "Stop staring at me and giggling and get dressed, you sillies. What's so funny now?"

"I was just wondering what the manager'd say if he'd come in and catch you ironing," grinned Peggy. "It's against the rules to iron in a room-at least, it is in all the hotels I've ever heard of."

Jo Ann flushed guiltily. Noticing that the sliding wood panel of the door was down and that someone might be able to peer between the slats of the blinds at the screened top, she implored Peggy to slide the panel up. Peggy obediently pushed the panel up as commanded, but no sooner had she turned away than it slipped down with a crash like a pistol shot.

Both girls jumped in alarm, and Jo Ann almost tumbled off the bed.

"Now we're in for it!" Jo Ann gasped. "Someone'll think we're shooting in here and will come to investigate. Shove that panel up again-quick. Push a chair against it to hold it in place."

After a few minutes had passed and no one had come to investigate, Jo Ann breathed more freely. Just as she was complimenting herself on coming to the finishing touches of her pressing, there came a sudden knocking at the door. Jo Ann was petrified. Was it the manager? She shook her head vigorously at Peggy, who was starting to open the door.

The next moment the door was rattled violently. Simultaneously the panel banged down again.

From the hall there sounded a woman's shrill voice.

"Miss Prudence!" the girls gasped.

"Open the door this instant, Peg, and get her inside before someone else comes," Jo Ann ordered.

The moment Miss Prudence stepped inside and saw Jo Ann perched on top of the bed, ironing, she stared in amazement. As soon as she had recovered from her first surprise, she burst out, "What does this mean? Don't you know it's against the rules to iron in your room? I've never stayed in a hotel anywhere that allowed ironing in the rooms. We'll get in trouble yet-besides having to pay extra money. You'd better stop this instant."

"But I'm most through now," Jo Ann replied meekly. "In a few minutes I'll have my dress finished."

"But just suppose the manager should knock on the door and catch you on top of the bed like this?"

As Miss Prudence was still worrying when Florence had finished dressing, she decided to see for herself what the hotel rules said about ironing. She walked over and began glancing at the printed rules hanging on the wall by the telephone.

A few moments later she stopped reading and burst into peals of laughter. "Oh, girls!" she exclaimed after she had checked her mirth a little. "This is rich! Funniest thing I've ever heard. The rules say--" She stopped and broke into uncontrollable laughter again.

Peggy ran over to read the rule that was causing Florence so much amusement. Then she too began to laugh, stopping only long enough to exclaim, "Oh-this is killing!"

"What's the joke? What on earth does that say?" Jo Ann demanded.

Peggy checked her laughter long enough to answer, "It says when a guest-wishes to iron-to call the office, and ironing board-and iron'll be sent up immediately."

Jo Ann's jaw dropped, as did Miss Prudence's. Their expressions were so ridiculous that Florence and Peggy continued laughing till the tears rolled down their cheeks.

After an amazed, "And to think I could've had a real iron and board for the asking!" Jo Ann began laughing equally merrily.

They were all still smiling broadly several minutes later when they went down to the lobby to meet Lucile and her mother, who were waiting for them there.

The dinner party turned out to be a great success, and the girls did not return to the hotel till almost eleven o'clock.

"It's my turn to sleep with Miss Prudence," Peggy remarked on entering the other girls' room, "but I'm scared to go in there and wake her up this late. She'd think it an unearthly hour." She stopped talking and smiled over at the girls. "Aren't you going to be polite and ask me to sleep with you? You'd better, because I'm going to, invitation or no invitation."

With a mock groan Jo Ann looked at the double bed and then at Peggy. "Say, Florence," she remarked finally, "I feel sorry for ourselves, don't you?"

"Put her in the middle where she can take the consequences," suggested Florence, her eyes twinkling.

Jo Ann grimaced. "The consequences'll probably be that you and I'll be out on the floor before the night's over."

After much subdued giggling and chatter the three girls finally climbed into bed and drifted off to sleep.

About five o'clock the next morning they were aroused by someone knocking at the door.

Peggy waked with a start. "Someone knocking! Maybe the hotel's afire and they're trying to rouse us!" darted through her mind.

She flung off the covers, tumbled over the sleeping Jo Ann, and rushed to the door to find an anxious-faced Miss Prudence.

"Thank goodness you're here, Peggy," Miss Prudence exclaimed. "I just woke up and found you weren't in my room, and I was so alarmed! Are the other girls here?" She snapped on the light and stood blinking at the frightened Florence and Jo Ann, who by this time were sitting up in bed, trying to figure out what had happened.

"Now that you're all awake you might as well dress, so we can get an early start," Miss Prudence announced crisply.

Jo Ann groaned audibly and sank back in the bed.

"Isn't it only about two or three o'clock?" Florence asked hesitatingly.

"Mercy, no! It's after five. It takes you girls so long to dress that it'll be six or half past before you'll be ready."

"Oh, but I'm so-so sleepy!" Peggy yawned. "Five o'clock's an awful hour to get up."

Miss Prudence eyed her severely. "You stayed up too late last night, probably. Just dash some cold water in your face-that'll wake you." She added with a whimsical note in her voice, "Perhaps I'd better do it for you-and sprinkle some on Florence and Jo Ann, too."

"Oh, have a heart, Miss Prudence!" Jo Ann begged, burrowing her head under the covers.

Seeing that Miss Prudence was in earnest about the early start and was going to stay there to see that they did get up and dress, Florence and Jo Ann reluctantly slipped out of bed.

"When we reach the mine, I'm going to sleep and sleep to make up for all this lost time," Jo Ann murmured to the girls between yawns as she was dressing.

"Maybe you'll even sleep through the siesta hour-you couldn't learn that trick last summer, it seemed," Peggy replied. "I take to sleeping the way Miss Prudence does to getting up with the chickens. Maybe the tropical heat'll make her more sleepy-headed down there."

Florence smiled. "Here's hoping it will."