I says to im, says Sadie, aint you the fresh thing! Who do you suppose I am, to be addressing such a remark to me? And what do you think he says back to me?
The heads, brown, black, flaxen, red, and yellow bob together; the answer is given; and the parry to the thrust is decided upon, to be used by each thereafter in passages-at-arms with the common enemy, man.
Thus Nancy learned the art of defense; and to women successful defense means victory.
The curriculum of a department store is a wide one. Perhaps no other college could have fitted her as well for her lifes ambition the drawing of a matrimonial prize.
Her station in the store was a favored one. The music room was near enough for her to hear and become familiar with the works of the best composers at least to acquire the familiarity that passed for appreciation in the social world in which she was vaguely trying to set a tentative and aspiring foot. She absorbed the educating influence of art wares, of costly and dainty fabrics, of adornments that are almost culture to women.
The other girls soon became aware of Nancys ambition. Here comes your millionaire, Nancy, they would call to her whenever any man who looked the rôle approached her counter. It got to be a habit of men, who were hanging about while their women folk were shopping, to stroll over to the handkerchief counter and dawdle over the cambric squares. Nancys imitation high-bred air and genuine dainty beauty was what attracted. Many men thus came to display their graces before her. Some of them may have been millionaires; others were certainly no more than their sedulous apes. Nancy learned to discriminate. There was a window at the end of the handkerchief counter; and she could see the rows of vehicles waiting for the shoppers in the street below. She looked and perceived that automobiles differ as well as do their owners.
The other girls soon became aware of Nancys ambition. Here comes your millionaire, Nancy, they would call to her whenever any man who looked the rôle approached her counter. It got to be a habit of men, who were hanging about while their women folk were shopping, to stroll over to the handkerchief counter and dawdle over the cambric squares. Nancys imitation high-bred air and genuine dainty beauty was what attracted. Many men thus came to display their graces before her. Some of them may have been millionaires; others were certainly no more than their sedulous apes. Nancy learned to discriminate. There was a window at the end of the handkerchief counter; and she could see the rows of vehicles waiting for the shoppers in the street below. She looked and perceived that automobiles differ as well as do their owners.
Once a fascinating gentleman bought four dozen handkerchiefs, and wooed her across the counter with a King Cophetua air. When he had gone one of the girls said:
Whats wrong, Nance, that you didnt warm up to that fellow. He looks the swell article, all right, to me.
Him? said Nancy, with her coolest, sweetest, most impersonal, Van Alstyne Fisher smile; not for mine. I saw him drive up outside. A 12 H. P. machine and an Irish chauffeur! And you saw what kind of handkerchiefs he bought silk! And hes got dactylis[20] on him. Give me the real thing or nothing, if you please.
Two of the most refined women in the store a forelady and a cashier had a few swell gentlemen friends with whom they now and then dined. Once they included Nancy in an invitation. The dinner took place in a spectacular café whose tables are engaged for New Years eve a year in advance. There were two gentlemen friends one without any hair on his head high living ungrew it; and we can prove it the other a young man whose worth and sophistication he impressed upon you in two convincing ways he swore that all the wine was corked; and he wore diamond cuff buttons. This young man perceived irresistible excellencies in Nancy. His taste ran to shop-girls; and here was one that added the voice and manners of his high social world to the franker charms of her own caste. So, on the following day, he appeared in the store and made her a serious proposal of marriage over a box of hem-stitched, grass-bleached Irish linens. Nancy declined. A brown pompadour ten feet away had been using her eyes and ears. When the rejected suitor had gone she heaped carboys of upbraidings and horror upon Nancys head.
What a terrible little fool you are! That fellows a millionaire hes a nephew of old Van Skittles himself. And he was talking on the level, too. Have you gone crazy, Nance?
Have I? said Nancy. I didnt take him, did I? He isnt a millionaire so hard that you could notice it, anyhow. His family only allows him $20,000 a year to spend. The bald-headed fellow was guying him about it the other night at supper.
The brown pompadour came nearer and narrowed her eyes.
Say, what do you want? she inquired, in a voice hoarse for lack of chewing-gum. Aint that enough for you? Do you want to be a Mormon[21], and marry Rockefeller and Gladstone Dowie and the King of Spain and the whole bunch? Aint $20,000 a year good enough for you?