He was surprised and disappointed when she didn’t appear on Monday
morning. At half past ten he gave her up and went out about some
business, reflecting upon the instability of women. He came back in half
an hour, and had just sat down at his desk when she entered, terribly
flushed and dusty. Her expression was defiant, but her voice
suspiciously uncertain.
“I’m very sorry to be so late,” she said. “It won’t happen again. I had
to walk, and I missed the way. But I’ll arrange better after this.”
To hide his own distress and hers, he promptly gave her something to
type--he didn’t care what--and sat down at his own desk, where he
pretended to work. But he _knew_, without venturing to turn his head,
that she was stealthily wiping her eyes, and he was sure there had been
some serious trouble at home. A five-mile walk along that dusty road, on
an August day! Poor girl!
There had indeed been a classic and unforgettable encounter, ending in a
drawn battle. She couldn’t get it out of her head, no matter how she
tried to concentrate her attention on this new work.
In the first place, her sister and her grandmother had both protested
passionately against her plan as soon as they heard of it. She had gone
home triumphantly to tell them that she had a “job” at eight dollars a
week, in Mr. Petersen’s office.
“Why, child!” cried the old lady, affronted. “What an idea!”
She was really shocked. A Defoe working for a Petersen!
Minnie, too, was shocked; they both argued, reasoned and expostulated,
but to no avail. Then Minnie, to the point:
“How do you expect to get there, Frankie?”
Her sister was slightly crestfallen.
“I thought you’d drive me in,” she admitted, “I’d pay you for it.”
“Thank you!” said Minnie, coldly. “But I couldn’t possibly. At that time
in the morning, with all the work to be done.”
“Very well,” said Frankie, “I’ll walk.”
She was confident that when the time came, Minnie would yield, Minnie
who was so kind-hearted, so self-sacrificing. And she couldn’t believe
it when Monday morning actually came, and she remained obdurate.
“I said I wouldn’t, and I _won’t_,” she repeated. “I don’t approve of
your working for that man, and I certainly shan’t help you in any way.”
Frances had no idea how to harness the horse; she was at her sister’s
mercy, absolutely.
“Minnie, don’t be such a beast! And a prig. You’re not my nurse, you
know. I’m old enough to decide for myself.”
“Decide everything you like,” Minnie replied, “but I shan’t help you in
such a nasty, undignified affair. I can’t stop you. Why don’t you walk?
You said you would.”
Frances looked at her with blazing scorn.
“You darned little hypocrite!” she cried. “Very well, I _will_ walk, if
it takes me all day.”
She wasn’t even sure of the way. She strode doggedly along in the dust
and the scorching sun, furious and defiant, for more than two hours.
“I’ll walk back and forth every day,” she said to herself, “if it kills
me. I won’t give in to her. She always gets her own way. Not this time,
though. I’ll wait till I get my first pay, and then I’ll hire someone. I
won’t give up this job!”
Twelve o’clock came.
“You’re a stranger here,” said Mr. Petersen, “perhaps you don’t know
where to go for lunch. If you’d do me the honour, this first day----”
She was not quite sure what was the proper course for a business woman,
but she knew that Mr. Petersen was absolutely “all right,” and to be
trusted, so she accepted, and went up the street to the Eagle House with
him.
The Eagle House was a fly-blown and extraordinarily dingy hotel
patronised by travelling salesmen; the food was horrible but the
atmosphere impeccably respectable. Frances was delighted with it. Never
before had she felt so adult, so independent. She was sure that Mr.
Petersen took her seriously, judged her upon her merits as an individual
and not as a Defoe or as a young girl--not as a female at all. She liked
him! She remembered what Minnie had said about him and rejected it all.
“Common,” “presumptuous,” “thick-skinned”; snobbish nonsense, all that!
They walked back to the office and spent a very agreeable afternoon
there. He explained the work to her, and was pleased by the quickness
with which she grasped his explanations. He saw that she would soon be
really very useful. She was not only intelligent and ambitious, but she
had that remarkable feminine loyalty, that willingness to use all her
powers in behalf of some one else, that is the curse and the glory of
her sex. She never viewed Mr. Petersen as an ambitious young man would
have done, as a stepping stone in her own career; she was genuinely
concerned with how she could help Mr. Petersen with Mr. Petersen’s
business.
Five o’clock came very soon, she thought. Mr. Petersen looked at the
clock and closed his desk.
“Closing time!” he said cheerfully, “I hope your first day in business
hasn’t----”
He stopped short because her face had changed so suddenly. She turned
pale as he was speaking.
“Oh!” she said, with a gasp.
“What’s the matter?” he asked, anxiously. “Are you ill?”
“No--only--I’d forgotten.... Is there a short cut?”
Even her fine courage faltered at the prospect of once more walking
those five dusty miles; it really appalled her. Yet, with a quite empty
pocketbook, what could she do?
“A short cut?” he repeated, puzzled. “But--you don’t mean to say you
expect to walk home?”
“I’ve got to!”
“Wait a bit!... I’ve a nice little trap in my stable. I’ll be back in
ten minutes to fetch you. No; I shan’t listen to you. It’s out of the
question, walking back.”
She was _so_ relieved. She climbed into his nice little trap, behind his
brisk little mare and they set off smartly. Of course, Mr. Petersen did
look undeniably like a coachman, with his back like a ramrod and his red
neck and his huge hands holding the reins so very correctly.... But what
_does_ it matter? “He’s a gentleman, if there ever was one,” she told
herself. “He’s a dear!”
They had not gone half the distance, when whom should they meet but
Minnie, in the ramshackle buggy, with the silly old horse. Her eyes were
red and her expression uncertain.
“Frankie!” she cried, “I’ve been so worried! Come right in here!”
She smiled a wan greeting at Mr. Petersen.
“I didn’t think she’d really do it,” she said. “I thought she’d turn
back. And when I realised that she’d really gone, all that long way----
You poor old Frankie!”
With her sister established by her side, she turned again to Mr.
Petersen.
“Well!” she said. “We’ll have to give in. And let her go. No matter how
much we miss her.”
Which gave him the impression that the objection to Frankie’s
enterprise was solely one of sentiment. An impression altogether false,
but then, he didn’t really know any of the Defoes or their principles.
It never occurred to him that it was disgraceful and shameful to work in
his office.
He looked after the sisters with a kindliness which had now become
almost affection, and he thought what a loving, unreasonable little soul
Minnie was. Couldn’t bear her sister out of her sight! A thorough woman,
she was!