Jean stood over him an instant, her anger still at white heat, but
the floor-walker had had enough of argument and only groveled cursing
where he fell. Leaving him without a word, she swept by a grinning
night-watchman and turned in at the adjacent offices, whither Rose
himself was bound. She had learned the ways of the place sufficiently
by now to know that members of the firm often lingered here after the
army which served them had gone, and she was determined that her own
story should reach them first. But the office of the head of the firm
was dark, and the consequential voice which answered her knock at the
door of a junior partner, where a light still shone, proved to be that
of a belated stenographer.
As she turned uncertainly away, Rose, nursing a swelling eye, again
confronted her.
"Thought you'd take it to headquarters, did you?" he said. "I advise
you to drop it right here."
He recoiled as she advanced, and warded an imaginary blow, but she only
passed him by contemptuously.
"Are you going to drop it?" he asked, following to the stairs. "I
don't want to see you get into trouble, for all your nasty temper. I'm
willing to overlook your striking me."
His persistence only fixed her resolution to expose him, and she
hurried on without reply.
"Two can play at that game," he warned over the rail.
In the street she paused irresolutely. The man would, of course,
protect himself if he could, and her own story should reach some member
of the firm to-night. If she waited till morning, Rose could easily
forestall her. Yet she had become too sophisticated not to shrink
from the idea of trying to take her grievance into one of those men's
homes. Only the other day she had picked up a trashy paper containing a
shop-girl story, warmly praised by Amy, which narrated an incident of
the kind. The son and heir of a merchant prince--so the author styled
him--had cruelly wronged the beautiful shop-girl, who, after harrowing
sorrows, took her courage in her hands and braved the ancestral
hall. She gained an entrance somehow (details were scanty here) and
confronted the base son and heir at the climax of a grand ball at which
the upper ten and other numerals were assembled to do honor to his
chosen bride. Jean had seen the absurdity of the picture as Amy could
not. Things did not fall out this wise in real life. The beautiful
shop-girl would never have gotten by the merchant prince's presumably
well-trained servants, even if she had eluded the specially detailed
policeman at the awning, and Jean judged that her own chances would be
as slender.
Nevertheless, there seemed to be nothing left her but to try. She
consulted a directory in the next drugstore and copied out the home
addresses of the several members of the firm. One of the junior
partners seemed to live nearest, though not within walking distance,
and at this address she finally arrived at an hour when, judging Fifth
Avenue by Mrs. St. Aubyn's, she feared she would find her employer at
dinner. She recognized the house as one which Amy had pointed out with
an air of proprietorship on their first Sunday walk, and she reflected
with misgiving that it was a really plausible setting for the drama of
the beautiful shop-girl, did such things exist.
An elderly butler convinced her that this was her own drama. He was not
unbearably haughty, a vast quantity of polite fiction to the contrary;
and if he scorned her clothes, he did not let the fact appear. His
manner even suggested decorous regret that the master of the house
was not at home. Jean went down the steps, wondering whether this
were an artistic lie, but, happily for the servant's reputation, an
electric cab at this moment drew up at the curb and dropped the man she
sought. She recognized him at once, for of all the firm he had the most
striking presence, looking very like the more jovial portraits of Henry
VIII. Unlike the Tudor king, however, he was said to be happily married
and of domestic tastes. He paused, giving her a keen look, when he
perceived that she meant to accost him.
"I just asked for you." Jean said. "I wanted to speak to you about
something at the store."
"You are one of our employees?"
"Yes. I am a sales girl in the toy department. I wish to make a serious
complaint."
"A complaint? Your own department is the proper channel for that."
"I cannot ask the man to judge himself," returned Jean, simply.
He gave her another sharp look.
"Oh," he said, with a change of tone. "Come in." Then, to the elderly
butler, who during this interval had held the door ajar with an air of
not listening, "The Study."
Jean seemed to recall that the beautiful shop-girl had encountered
a "study," which could have been no more luxurious than this. She
queried, while she waited, what the library and more pretentious
apartments could be like. The room seemed to her of regal splendor.
It was paneled and cross-beamed, and a fireplace in keeping with
the architecture well-nigh filled one end wall. The light fell from
a wonderful affair of opalescent glass which gave new tones to the
oriental fabrics underfoot and added richness to the lavishly employed
mahogany. No other wood had been permitted here. It glowed dully from
beam, panel, and cornice; from the mantel, the bookshelves, the carved
cabinet concealing a safe; from the massive griffin-legged desk at
which the owner of it all, as florid as his taste, presently took his
seat.
"Now, then," he said, "tell me explicitly what you charge."
She omitted nothing. Her listener followed her closely and once,
when she gave Rose's version of the firm's policy, he shook his head
dissentingly, but whether in disbelief of herself or in condemnation of
the floor-walker, she could not guess.
"This is a grave accusation," he said, when she had done. "It
involves not only Mr. Rose,--who, let me say, has always been most
efficient,--but the good name of the whole establishment."
"That is one reason why I came."
"Of the whole establishment," repeated the junior partner, as if she
had not spoken. "Was there a third party present?"
"There was a watchman near by, but he couldn't have heard what was
said."
"You are quite sure you did not misunderstand Mr. Rose?"
"Quite."
"And were not prejudiced against him in advance? Floor-walkers as a
class have often been maligned."
Jean reflected carefully.
"I can't say no to that," she owned frankly. "A friend had a poor
opinion of him and said so before I began work, but I tried not to let
that influence me."
"But it did?"
"A little, perhaps. I admit I've never liked him."
For a time the big man under the drop-light trifled absently with a
paper-knife.
"We'll take this matter up, of course," he said presently. "If we need
a housecleaning, we'll have it; but I can't believe that things are
radically at fault. No department store in the city is more considerate
of its people. We were among the first to close Saturday afternoons
in midsummer; we offer liberal inducements for special energy during
the holidays; we have provided exceedingly attractive lunch-rooms; we
even hope, when trade conditions permit, to introduce a form of profit
sharing. What more can we do?"
Jean supposed his rhetorical query personal.
"You might pay better wages," she suggested. "Then things like this
wouldn't happen."
For the fraction of a second King Henry wore one of his less amiable
expressions. It suggested beheading or long confinement in the Tower.
Then, immediately, it was glossed by modernity.
"There you trench upon economic grounds," he rejoined heavily. "I wish
we might inaugurate a lecture course for our employees, to elucidate
the principles which govern a great business. The law of supply and
demand, the press of competition, the necessity for costly advertising,
these and countless other considerations, which we at the helm
appreciate, never enter the shop-girl's head."
Jean was overborne by these impressive phrases. They had never entered
her head, certainly, and she was not altogether sure why they should.
"We only ask a living," she said.
"But you shouldn't. We want the girl who asks pin-money, the girl who
lives with her family. Have you no family yourself, by the way?"
"My mother is living."
"Is she dependent upon you in any way?"
"No."
"Is she able to provide for you?"
"Perfectly."
"Then why doesn't she?"
Jean's eyes snapped.
"Because I won't let her."
Her listener shrugged.
"The modern woman!" he lamented. "But this is beside the question. We
pay as others pay. If a girl thinks it insufficient, let her find other
work. So far, I uphold Mr. Rose. His further advice--as you report
it--is another matter. As I have said, we will take it up."
He touched a bell and rose, and Jean followed the elderly servant to
the door. The impetus which had brought her here had subsided into
great weariness of body and spirit, but she went down the avenue not
ill satisfied. She had had her hearing. She had spoken, not for herself
alone, but in a measure for others. Moreover, the man's bluff candor
seemed an earnest that justice would be done. Precisely what form
justice would take, she did not speculate.
Near her own door she met Paul on anxious lookout for her.
"I was beginning to imagine a fine bunch of horrors," he said. "Amy
hadn't a ghost of a notion what was up."
"I did not tell Amy I should be late," Jean replied. She offered no
explanations, but Paul's concern was grateful after what she had
undergone, and she added, "I'm sorry you worried."
He eyed her narrowly, pausing an instant at the steps.
"Any need for a man of my build?" he inquired.
"Why do you ask that?"
"Because I think you're in trouble. If I can help--"
"No, no," she returned hastily. "But thank you."
"Something has happened?"
"Yes; at the store. I can't very well explain it."
"Oh," said Paul, as if explanations were needless. "I'm not so sure I
couldn't be useful."
She felt that he divined something of what had transpired, his
knowledge of the floor-walker being perhaps fuller than her own, but he
said no more. Jean was singularly comforted by his attitude, especially
since Amy's, as presently defined, left much to be desired. She seemed
less amazed at Rose's behavior than at Jean's active resentment.
"I wouldn't have struck him," she said.
"What would you have done?"
"I--I don't know. At any rate, not that. A girl has to put up with a
lot."
"I presume you wouldn't have reported him, either?" Jean flung out
bitterly.
"No; I didn't--I mean I wouldn't."
Jean started.
"I think you meant just what you said first, Amy," she cried. "Has he
told you the same thing?"
Amy writhed.
"N-no," she began; "that is--"
"Almost, then?"
"Yes."
"And you did nothing?"
"I didn't dare do anything. I don't see how you dared. It's too big a
risk."
"I would have risked more in keeping quiet. I simply had to take it
higher up."
"But you said Mr. Rose offered to let it drop," Amy timidly reminded.
"You could have done that."
"That!" She had no words to voice her scorn.
They went to bed and rose again in an atmosphere of constraint, and
Jean walked to her day's work alone. She dreaded meeting Rose, and
apprehended another interview with the junior partner, an ordeal
which wore a more forbidding aspect by day. But neither happened. The
floor-walker did not appear in the toy department at all, though some
one had seen him enter the building. It was rumored that he was ill.
Toward the end of the afternoon Jean noticed that she had become an
object of some interest to the forewoman, and wondered hopefully
if this influential personage had marked her for promotion. Her
pay-envelope, for it was Saturday, shortly furnished a clew to the
mystery in the shape of a neat slip informing her that her services
were no longer required.
"I'm to answer questions if you have any," the forewoman told her,
shortly; "but I guess you understand."
The girl turned a chalky face upon her.
"But I don't--"
"Then you're slower than I thought. The firm has looked you up, that's
all."
Jean realized the monstrous injustice of it but slowly.
"I don't see," she faltered.
"Bosh!" cut in the woman, impatiently. "Don't try to flimflam me. Lord
knows what kind of game you were working, but you had more nerve than
sense. You might have guessed when you tried to put your bare word
against Mr. Rose's that they'd make it their business to find out just
what your word was worth. Your last employer told them."
"Told them what?" blazed Jean.
"What do you suppose? That you'd done time in a reformatory, of
course."