Ardessa
By Willa Cather
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The grand-mannered old man who sat at a desk in the
reception-room of The Outcry offices to receive visitors
and incidentally to keep the time-book of the employees,
looked up as Miss Devine entered at ten minutes past ten and
condescendingly wished him good morning. He bowed profoundly
as she minced past his desk, and with an indifferent
air took her course down the corridor that led to the editorial
offices. Mechanically he opened the flat, black book at his elbow
and placed his finger on D, running his eye along the
line of figures after the name Devine. Its bankers hours she
keeps, indeed, he muttered. What was the use of entering so
capricious a record? Nevertheless, with his usual preliminary
flourish he wrote 10:10 under this, the fourth day of May.
The employee who kept bankers hours rustled on down
the corridor to her private room, hung up her lavender jacket
and her trim spring hat, and readjusted her side combs by the
mirror inside her closet door. Glancing at her desk, she rang
for an office boy, and reproved him because he had not
dusted more carefully and because there were lumps in her
paste. When he disappeared with the paste-jar, she sat down
to decide which of her employers letters he should see and
which he should not.
Ardessa was not young and she was certainly not handsome.
The coquettish angle at which she carried her head was
a mannerism surviving from a time when it was more becoming.
She shuddered at the cold candor of the new business
woman, and was insinuatingly feminine.
Ardessas employer, like young Lochinvar, had come out of
the West, and he had done a great many contradictory things
before he became proprietor and editor of The Outcry.
Before he decided to go to New York and make the East
take notice of him, OMally had acquired a punctual, reliable
silver-mine in South Dakota. This silent friend in the background
made his journalistic success comparatively easy. He
had figured out, when he was a rich nobody in Nevada, that
the quickest way to cut into the known world was through
the printing-press. He arrived in New York, bought a highly
respectable publication, and turned it into a red-hot magazine
of protest, which he called The Outcry. He knew what the
West wanted, and it proved to be what everybody secretly
wanted. In six years he had done the thing that had hitherto
seemed impossible: built up a national weekly, out on the
news-stands the same day in New York and San Francisco; a
magazine the people howled for, a moving-picture film of
their real tastes and interests.
OMally bought The Outcry to make a stir, not to make
a career, but he had got built into the thing more than he ever
intended. It had made him a public man and put him into
politics. He found the publicity game diverting, and it held
him longer than any other game had ever done. He had built
up about him an organization of which he was somewhat
afraid and with which he was vastly bored. On his staff there
were five famous men, and he had made every one of them.
At first it amused him to manufacture celebrities. He found
he could take an average reporter from the daily press, give
him a line to follow, a trust to fight, a vice to expose,this
was all in that good time when people were eager to read
about their own wickedness,and in two years the reporter
would be recognized as an authority. Other peopleNapoleon,
Disraeli, Sarah Bernhardthad discovered that advertising
would go a long way; but Marcus OMally discovered
that in America it would go all the wayas far as you wished
to pay its passage. Any human countenance, plastered in
three-sheet posters from sea to sea, would be revered by the
American people. The strangest thing was that the owners of
these grave countenances, staring at their own faces on newsstands
and billboards, fell to venerating themselves; and even
he, OMally, was more or less constrained by these reputations
that he had created out of cheap paper and cheap ink.
Constraint was the last thing OMally liked. The most engaging
and unusual thing about the man was that he couldnt
be fooled by the success of his own methods, and no amount
of recognition could make a stuffed shirt of him. No matter
how much he was advertised as a great medicine-man in the
councils of the nation, he knew that he was a born gambler
and a soldier of fortune. He left his dignified office to take
care of itself for a good many months of the year while he
played about on the outskirts of social order. He liked being a
great man from the East in rough-and-tumble Western cities
where he had once been merely an unconsidered spender.
OMallys long absences constituted one of the supreme advantages
of Ardessa Devines position. When he was at his
post her duties were not heavy, but when he was giving balls
in Goldfield, Nevada, she lived an ideal life. She came to the
office every day, indeed, to forward such of OMallys letters
as she thought best, to attend to his club notices and tradesmens
bills, and to taste the sense of her high connections.
The great men of the staff were all about her, as contemplative
as Buddhas in their private offices, each meditating upon
the particular trust or form of vice confided to his care. Thus
surrounded, Ardessa had a pleasant sense of being at the heart
of things. It was like a mental massage, exercise without exertion.
She read and she embroidered. Her room was pleasant,
and she liked to be seen at ladylike tasks and to feel herself a
graceful contrast to the crude girls in the advertising and
circulation departments across the hall. The younger stenographers,
who had to get through with the enormous office
correspondence, and who rushed about from one editor to
another with wire baskets full of letters, made faces as they
passed Ardessas door and saw her cool and cloistered,
daintily plying her needle. But no matter how hard the other
stenographers were driven, no one, not even one of the
five oracles of the staff, dared dictate so much as a letter to
Ardessa. Like a sultans bride, she was inviolate in her lords
absence; she had to be kept for him.
Naturally the other young women employed in The Outcry
offices disliked Miss Devine. They were all competent
girls, trained in the exacting methods of modern business, and
they had to make good every day in the week, had to get
through with a great deal of work or lose their position.
OMallys private secretary was a mystery to them. Her exemptions
and privileges, her patronizing remarks, formed an
exhaustless subject of conversation at the lunch-hour. Ardessa
had, indeed, as they knew she must have, a kind of purchase
on her employer.
When OMally first came to New York to break into publicity,
he engaged Miss Devine upon the recommendation of
the editor whose ailing publication he bought and rechristened.
That editor was a conservative, scholarly gentleman of
the old school, who was retiring because he felt out of place
in the world of brighter, breezier magazines that had been
flowering since the new century came in. He believed that in
this vehement world young OMally would make himself
heard and that Miss Devines training in an editorial office
would be of use to him.
When OMally first sat down at a desk to be an editor, all
the cards that were brought in looked pretty much alike to
him. Ardessa was at his elbow. She had long been steeped in
literary distinctions and in the social distinctions which used
to count for much more than they do now. She knew all the
great men, all the nephews and clients of great men. She
knew which must be seen, which must be made welcome, and
which could safely be sent away. She could give OMally on
the instant the former rating in magazine offices of nearly
every name that was brought in to him. She could give him
an idea of the mans connections, of the price his work commanded,
and insinuate whether he ought to be met with the
old punctiliousness or with the new joviality. She was useful
in explaining to her employer the significance of various invitations,
and the standing of clubs and associations. At first she
was virtually the social mentor of the bullet-headed young
Westerner who wanted to break into everything, the solitary
person about the office of the humming new magazine who
knew anything about the editorial traditions of the eighties
and nineties which, antiquated as they now were, gave an
editor, as OMally said, a background.
Despite her indolence, Ardessa was useful to OMally as a
social reminder. She was the card catalogue of his ever-changing
personal relations. OMally went in for everything
and got tired of everything; that was why he made a good
editor. After he was through with people, Ardessa was very
skilful in covering his retreat. She read and answered the letters
of admirers who had begun to bore him. When great
authors, who had been dined and feted the month before,
were suddenly left to cool their heels in the reception-room,
thrown upon the suave hospitality of the grand old man at
the desk, it was Ardessa who went out and made soothing
and plausible explanations as to why the editor could not see
them. She was the brake that checked the too-eager neophyte,
the emollient that eased the severing of relationships, the gentle
extinguisher of the lights that failed. When there were no
longer messages of hope and cheer to be sent to ardent young
writers and reformers, Ardessa delivered, as sweetly as possible,
whatever messages were left.
In handling these people with whom OMally was quite
through, Ardessa had gradually developed an industry which
was immensely gratifying to her own vanity. Not only did she
not crush them; she even fostered them a little. She continued
to advise them in the reception-room and personally received
their manuscripts long after OMally had declared that
he would never read another line they wrote. She let them
outline their plans for stories and articles to her, promising to
bring these suggestions to the editors attention. She denied
herself to nobody, was gracious even to the Shakspere-Bacon
man, the perpetual-motion man, the travel-article man, the
ghosts which haunt every magazine office. The writers who
had had their happy hour of OMallys favor kept feeling that
Ardessa might reinstate them. She answered their letters of
inquiry in her most polished and elegant style, and even gave
them hints as to the subjects in which the restless editor was
or was not interested at the moment: she feared it would be
useless to send him an article on How to Trap Lions, because
he had just bought an article on Elephant-Shooting in
Majuba Land, etc.
So when OMally plunged into his office at 11:30 on this,
the fourth day of May, having just got back from three-days
fishing, he found Ardessa in the reception-room, surrounded
by a little court of discards. This was annoying, for he always
wanted his stenographer at once. Telling the office boy to give
her a hint that she was needed, he threw off his hat and topcoat
and began to race through the pile of letters Ardessa had
put on his desk. When she entered, he did not wait for her
polite inquiries about his trip, but broke in at once.
What is that fellow who writes about phossy jaw still
hanging round here for? I dont want any articles on phossy
jaw, and if I did, I wouldnt want his.
He has just sold an article on the match industry to The
New Age, Mr. OMally, Ardessa replied as she took her seat
at the editors right.
Why does he have to come and tell us about it? Weve
nothing to do with The New Age. And that prison-reform
guy, whats he loafing about for?
Ardessa bridled.
You remember, Mr. OMally, he brought letters of introduction
from Governor Harper, the reform Governor of
Mississippi.
OMally jumped up, kicking over his waste-basket in his
impatience.
That was months ago. I went through his letters and went
through him, too. He hasnt got anything we want. Ive been
through with Governor Harper a long while. Were asleep at
the switch in here. And let me tell you, if I catch sight of that
causes-of-blindness-in-babies woman around here again, Ill
do something violent. Clear them out, Miss Devine! Clear
them out! We need a traffic policeman in this office. Have you
got that article on Stealing Our National Water Power ready
for me?
Mr. Gerrard took it back to make modifications. He gave
it to me at noon on Saturday, just before the office closed. I
will have it ready for you to-morrow morning, Mr. OMally,
if you have not too many letters for me this afternoon, Ardessa
replied pointedly.
Holy Mike! muttered OMally, we need a traffic policeman
for the staff, too. Gerrards modified that thing half a
dozen times already. Why dont they get accurate information
in the first place?
He began to dictate his morning mail, walking briskly up
and down the floor by way of giving his stenographer an energetic
example. Her indolence and her ladylike deportment
weighed on him. He wanted to take her by the elbows and
run her around the block. He didnt mind that she loafed
when he was away, but it was becoming harder and harder to
speed her up when he was on the spot. He knew his correspondence
was not enough to keep her busy, so when he was
in town he made her type his own breezy editorials and various
articles by members of his staff.
Transcribing editorial copy is always laborious, and the
only way to make it easy is to farm it out. This Ardessa was
usually clever enough to do. When she returned to her own
room after OMally had gone out to lunch, Ardessa rang for
an office boy and said languidly, James, call Becky, please.
In a moment a thin, tense-faced Hebrew girl of eighteen or
nineteen came rushing in, carrying a wire basket full of typewritten
sheets. She was as gaunt as a plucked spring chicken,
and her cheap, gaudy clothes might have been thrown on her.
She looked as if she were running to catch a train and in
mortal dread of missing it. While Miss Devine examined the
pages in the basket, Becky stood with her shoulders drawn up
and her elbows drawn in, apparently trying to hide herself in
her insufficient open-work waist. Her wild, black eyes followed
Miss Devines hands desperately. Ardessa sighed.
This seems to be very smeary copy again, Becky. You
dont keep your mind on your work, and so you have to erase
continually.
Becky spoke up in wailing self-vindication.
It aint that, Miss Devine. Its so many hard words he uses
that I have to be at the dictionary all the time. Look! Look!
She produced a bunch of manuscript faintly scrawled in pencil,
and thrust it under Ardessas eyes. He dont write out the
words at all. He just begins a word, and then makes waves for
you to guess.
I see you havent always guessed correctly, Becky, said
Ardessa, with a weary smile. There are a great many words
here that would surprise Mr. Gerrard, I am afraid.
And the inserts, Becky persisted. How is anybody to tell
where they go, Miss Devine? Its mostly inserts; see, all over
the top and sides and back.
Ardessa turned her head away.
Dont claw the pages like that, Becky. You make me nervous.
Mr. Gerrard has not time to dot his is and cross his ts.
That is what we keep copyists for. I will correct these sheets
for you,it would be terrible if Mr. OMally saw them,and
then you can copy them over again. It must be done by
to-morrow morning, so you may have to work late. See that
your hands are clean and dry, and then you will not smear it.
Yes, maam. Thank you, Miss Devine. Will you tell the
janitor, please, its all right if I have to stay? He was cross
because I was here Saturday afternoon doing this. He said it
was a holiday, and when everybody else was gone I ought
to
That will do, Becky. Yes, I will speak to the janitor for
you. You may go to lunch now.
Becky turned on one heel and then swung back.
Miss Devine, she said anxiously, will it be all right if I
get white shoes for now?
Ardessa gave her kind consideration.
For office wear, you mean? No, Becky. With only one
pair, you could not keep them properly clean; and black shoes
are much less conspicuous. Tan, if you prefer.
Becky looked down at her feet. They were too large, and
her skirt was as much too short as her legs were too long.
Nearly all the girls I know wear white shoes to business,
she pleaded.
They are probably little girls who work in factories or department
stores, and that is quite another matter. Since you
raise the question, Becky, I ought to speak to you about your
new waist. Dont wear it to the office again, please. Those
cheap open-work waists are not appropriate in an office like
this. They are all very well for little chorus girls.
But Miss Kalski wears expensive waists to business more
open than this, and jewelry
Ardessa interrupted. Her face grew hard.
Miss Kalski, she said coldly, works for the business department.
You are employed in the editorial offices. There is a
great difference. You see, Becky, I might have to call you in
here at any time when a scientist or a great writer or the
president of a university is here talking over editorial matters,
and such clothes as you have on to-day would make a bad
impression. Nearly all our connections are with important
people of that kind, and we ought to be well, but quietly,
dressed.
Yes, Miss Devine. Thank you, Becky gasped and disappeared.
Heaven knew she had no need to be further impressed
with the greatness of The Outcry office. During
the year and a half she had been there she had never ceased to
tremble. She knew the prices all the authors got as well as
Miss Devine did, and everything seemed to her to be done on
a magnificent scale. She hadnt a good memory for long technical
words, but she never forgot dates or prices or initials or
telephone numbers.
Becky felt that her job depended on Miss Devine, and she
was so glad to have it that she scarcely realized she was being
bullied. Besides, she was grateful for all that she had learned
from Ardessa; Ardessa had taught her to do most of the
things that she was supposed to do herself. Becky wanted to
learn, she had to learn; that was the train she was always running
for. Her father, Isaac Tietelbaum, the tailor, who pressed
Miss Devines skirts and kept her ladylike suits in order, had
come to his client two years ago and told her he had a bright
girl just out of a commercial high school. He implored Ardessa
to find some office position for his daughter. Ardessa told
an appealing story to OMally, and brought Becky into the
office, at a salary of six dollars a week, to help with the copying
and to learn business routine. When Becky first came she
was as ignorant as a young savage. She was rapid at her shorthand
and typing, but a Kafir girl would have known as much
about the English language. Nobody ever wanted to learn
more than Becky. She fairly wore the dictionary out. She dug
up her old school grammar and worked over it at night. She
faithfully mastered Miss Devines fussy system of punctuation.
There were eight children at home, younger than Becky,
and they were all eager to learn. They wanted to get their
mother out of the three dark rooms behind the tailor shop
and to move into a flat up-stairs, where they could, as Becky
said, live private. The young Tietelbaums doubted their fathers
ability to bring this change about, for the more things
he declared himself ready to do in his window placards, the
fewer were brought to him to be done. Dyeing, Cleaning,
Ladies Furs Remodeledit did no good.
Rebecca was out to improve herself, as her father had
told her she must. Ardessa had easy way with her. It was one
of those rare relationships from which both persons profit.
The more Becky could learn from Ardessa, the happier she
was; and the more Ardessa could unload on Becky, the
greater was her contentment. She easily broke Becky of the
gum-chewing habit, taught her to walk quietly, to efface herself
at the proper moment, and to hold her tongue. Becky had
been raised to eight dollars a week; but she didnt care half so
much about that as she did about her own increasing efficiency.
The more work Miss Devine handed over to her the
happier she was, and the faster she was able to eat it up. She
tested and tried herself in every possible way. She now had
full confidence that she would surely one day be a high-priced
stenographer, a real business woman.
Becky would have corrupted a really industrious person,
but a bilious temperament like Ardessas couldnt make even
a feeble stand against such willingness. Ardessa had grown
soft and had lost the knack of turning out work. Sometimes,
in her importance and serenity, she shivered. What if OMally
should die, and she were thrust out into the world to work in
competition with the brazen, competent young women she
saw about her everywhere? She believed herself indispensable,
but she knew that in such a mischanceful world as this the
very powers of darkness might rise to separate her from this
pearl among jobs.
When Becky came in from lunch she went down the long hall
to the wash-room, where all the little girls who worked in
the advertising and circulation departments kept their hats
and jackets. There were shelves and shelves of bright spring
hats, piled on top of one another, all as stiff as sheet-iron and
trimmed with gay flowers. At the marble wash-stand stood
Rena Kalski, the right bower of the business manager, polishing
her diamond rings with a nail-brush.
Hullo, kid, she called over her shoulder to Becky. Ive
got a ticket for you for Thursday afternoon.
Beckys black eyes glowed, but the strained look on her
face drew tighter than ever.
Ill never ask her, Miss Kalski, she said rapidly. I dont
dare. I have to stay late to-night again; and I know shed be
hard to please after, if I was to try to get off on a week-day. I
thank you, Miss Kalski, but Id better not.
Miss Kalski laughed. She was a slender young Hebrew,
handsome in an impudent, Tenderloin sort of way, with a
small head, reddish-brown almond eyes, a trifle tilted, a rapacious
mouth, and a beautiful chin.
Aint you under that womans thumb, though! Call her
bluff. She isnt half the prima donna she thinks she is. On my
side of the hall we know whos who about this place.
The business and editorial departments of The Outcry
were separated by a long corridor and a great contempt. Miss
Kalski dried her rings with tissue-paper and studied them
with an appraising eye.
Well, since youre such a fraidy-calf, she went on,
maybe I can get a rise out of her myself. Now Ive got you a
ticket out of that shirt-front, I want you to go. Ill drop in on
Devine this afternoon.
When Miss Kalski went back to her desk in the business
managers private office, she turned to him familiarly, but not
impertinently.
Mr. Henderson, I want to send a kid over in the editorial
stenographers to the Palace Thursday afternoon. Shes a nice
kid, only shes scared out of her skin all the time. Miss
Devines her boss, and shell be just mean enough not to let
the young one off. Would you say a word to her?
The business manager lit a cigar.
Im not saying words to any of the high-brows over there.
Try it out with Devine yourself. Youre not bashful.
Miss Kalski shrugged her shoulders and smiled.
Oh, very well. She serpentined out of the room and
crossed the Rubicon into the editorial offices. She found Ardessa
typing OMallys letters and wearing a pained expression.
Good afternoon, Miss Devine, she said carelessly. Can
we borrow Becky over there for Thursday afternoon? Were
short.
Miss Devine looked piqued and tilted her head.
I dont think its customary, Miss Kalski, for the business
department to use our people. We never have girls enough
here to do the work. Of course if Mr. Henderson feels justified
Thanks awfully, Miss Devine,Miss Kalski interrupted
her with the perfectly smooth, good-natured tone which
never betrayed a hint of the scorn every line of her sinuous
figure expressed,I will tell Mr. Henderson. Perhaps we
can do something for you some day. Whether this was a
threat, a kind wish, or an insinuation, no mortal could have
told. Miss Kalskis face was always suggesting insolence without
being quite insolent. As she returned to her own domain
she met the cashiers head clerk in the hall. That Devine
womans a crime, she murmured. The head clerk laughed
tolerantly.
That afternoon as Miss Kalski was leaving the office at 5:15,
on her way down the corridor she heard a typewriter clicking
away in the empty, echoing editorial offices. She looked in,
and found Becky bending forward over the machine as if she
were about to swallow it.
Hello, kid. Do you sleep with that? she called. She
walked up to Becky and glanced at her copy. What do you
let em keep you up nights over that stuff for? she asked
contemptuously. The world wouldnt suffer if that stuff
never got printed.
Rebecca looked up wildly. Not even Miss Kalskis French
pansy hat or her ear-rings and landscape veil could loosen
Beckys tenacious mind from Mr. Gerrards article on water
power. She scarcely knew what Miss Kalski had said to her,
certainly not what she meant.
But I must make progress already, Miss Kalski, she
panted.
Miss Kalski gave her low, siren laugh.
I should say you must! she ejaculated.
Ardessa decided to take her vacation in June, and she
arranged that Miss Milligan should do OMallys work
while she was away. Miss Milligan was blunt and noisy,
rapid and inaccurate. It would be just as well for OMally to
work with a coarse instrument for a time; he would be more
appreciative, perhaps, of certain qualities to which he had
seemed insensible of late. Ardessa was to leave for East
Hampton on Sunday, and she spent Saturday morning instructing
her substitute as to the state of the correspondence.
At noon OMally burst into her room. All the morning he
had been closeted with a new writer of mystery-stories just
over from England.
Can you stay and take my letters this afternoon, Miss
Devine? Youre not leaving until to-morrow.
Ardessa pouted, and tilted her head at the angle he was
tired of.
Im sorry, Mr. OMally, but Ive left all my shopping for
this afternoon. I think Becky Tietelbaum could do them for
you. I will tell her to be careful.
Oh, all right. OMally bounced out with a reflection of
Ardessas disdainful expression on his face. Saturday afternoon
was always a half-holiday, to be sure, but since she had
weeks of freedom when he was awayHowever
At two oclock Becky Tietelbaum appeared at his door, clad
in the sober office suit which Miss Devine insisted she should
wear, her note-book in her hand, and so frightened that her
fingers were cold and her lips were pale. She had never taken
dictation from the editor before. It was a great and terrifying
occasion.
Sit down, he said encouragingly. He began dictating
while he shook from his bag the manuscripts he had snatched
away from the amazed English author that morning. Presently
he looked up.
Do I go too fast?
No, sir, Becky found strength to say.
At the end of an hour he told her to go and type as many
of the letters as she could while he went over the bunch of
stuff he had torn from the Englishman. He was with the
Hindu detective in an opium den in Shanghai when Becky
returned and placed a pile of papers on his desk.
How many? he asked, without looking up.
All you gave me, sir.
All, so soon? Wait a minute and let me see how many
mistakes. He went over the letters rapidly, signing them as
he read. They seem to be all right. I thought you were the
girl that made so many mistakes.
Rebecca was never too frightened to vindicate herself.
Mr. OMally, sir, I dont make mistakes with letters. Its
only copying the articles that have so many long words, and
when the writing isnt plain, like Mr. Gerrards. I never make
many mistakes with Mr. Johnsons articles, or with yours I
dont.
OMally wheeled round in his chair, looked with curiosity
at her long, tense face, her black eyes, and straight brows.
Oh, so you sometimes copy articles, do you? How does
that happen?
Yes, sir. Always Miss Devine gives me the articles to do.
Its good practice for me.
I see. OMally shrugged his shoulders. He was thinking
that he could get a rise out of the whole American public any
day easier than he could get a rise out of Ardessa. What
editorials of mine have you copied lately, for instance?
Rebecca blazed out at him, reciting rapidly:
Oh, A Word about the Rosenbaums, Useless Navy-Yards,
Who Killed Cock Robin
Wait a minute. OMally checked her flow. What was
that one aboutCock Robin?
It was all about why the secretary of the interior dismissed
All right, all right. Copy those letters, and put them down
the chute as you go out. Come in here for a minute on Monday
morning.
Becky hurried home to tell her father that she had taken the
editors letters and had made no mistakes. On Monday she
learned that she was to do OMallys work for a few days. He
disliked Miss Milligan, and he was annoyed with Ardessa for
trying to put her over on him when there was better material
at hand. With Rebecca he got on very well; she was impersonal,
unreproachful, and she fairly panted for work. Everything
was done almost before he told her what he wanted.
She raced ahead with him; it was like riding a good modern
bicycle after pumping along on an old hard tire.
On the day before Miss Devines return OMally strolled
over for a chat with the business office.
Henderson, your people are taking vacations now, I suppose?
Could you use an extra girl?
If its that thin black one, I can.
OMally gave him a wise smile.
It isnt. To be honest, I want to put one over on you. I
want you to take Miss Devine over here for a while and speed
her up. I cant do anything. Shes got the upper hand of me. I
dont want to fire her, you understand, but she makes my life
too difficult. Its my fault, of course. Ive pampered her. Give
her a chance over here; maybe shell come back. You can be
firm with em, cant you?
Henderson glanced toward the desk where Miss Kalskis
lightning eye was skimming over the printing-house bills that
he was supposed to verify himself.
Well, if I cant, I know who can, he replied, with a
chuckle.
Exactly, OMally agreed. Im counting on the force of
Miss Kalskis example. Miss Devines all right, Miss Kalski,
but she needs regular exercise. She owes it to her complexion.
I cant discipline people.
Miss Kalskis only reply was a low, indulgent laugh.
OMally braced himself on the morning of Ardessas return.
He told the waiter at his club to bring him a second pot of
coffee and to bring it hot. He was really afraid of her. When
she presented herself at his office at 10:30 he complimented
her upon her tan and asked about her vacation. Then he
broke the news to her.
We want to make a few temporary changes about here,
Miss Devine, for the summer months. The business department
is short of help. Henderson is going to put Miss Kalski
on the books for a while to figure out some economies for
him, and he is going to take you over. Meantime Ill get
Becky broken in so that she could take your work if you were
sick or anything.
Ardessa drew herself up.
Ive not been accustomed to commercial work, Mr.
OMally. Ive no interest in it, and I dont care to brush up in
it.
Brushing up is just what we need, Miss Devine. OMally
began tramping about his room expansively. Im going to
brush everybody up. Im going to brush a few people out;
but I want you to stay with us, of course. You belong here.
Dont be hasty now. Go to your room and think it over.
Ardessa was beginning to cry, and OMally was afraid he
would lose his nerve. He looked out of the window at a new
sky-scraper that was building, while she retired without a
word.
At her own desk Ardessa sat down breathless and trembling.
The one thing she had never doubted was her unique
value to OMally. She had, as she told herself, taught him
everything. She would say a few things to Becky Tietelbaum,
and to that pigeon-breasted tailor, her father, too! The worst
of it was that Ardessa had herself brought it all about; she
could see that clearly now. She had carefully trained and qualified
her successor. Why had she ever civilized Becky? Why
had she taught her manners and deportment, broken her of
the gum-chewing habit, and made her presentable? In her
original state OMally would never have put up with her, no
matter what her ability.
Ardessa told herself that OMally was notoriously fickle;
Becky amused him, but he would soon find out her limitations.
The wise thing, she knew, was to humor him; but it
seemed to her that she could not swallow her pride. Ardessa
grew yellower within the hour. Over and over in her mind
she bade OMally a cold adieu and minced out past the grand
old man at the desk for the last time. But each exit she rehearsed
made her feel sorrier for herself. She thought over all
the offices she knew, but she realized that she could never
meet their inexorable standards of efficiency.
While she was bitterly deliberating, OMally himself wandered
in, rattling his keys nervously in his pocket. He shut the
door behind him.
Now, youre going to come through with this all right,
arent you, Miss Devine? I want Henderson to get over the
notion that my people over here are stuck up and think the
business department are old shoes. Thats where we get our
money from, as he often reminds me. Youll be the best-paid
girl over there; no reduction, of course. You dont want to go
wandering off to some new office where personality doesnt
count for anything. He sat down confidentially on the edge
of her desk. Do you, now, Miss Devine?
Ardessa simpered tearfully as she replied.
Mr. OMally, she brought out, youll soon find that
Becky is not the sort of girl to meet people for you when you
are away. I dont see how you can think of letting her.
Thats one thing I want to change, Miss Devine. Youre
too soft-handed with the has-beens and the never-was-ers.
Youre too much of a lady for this rough game. Nearly everybody
who comes in here wants to sell us a gold-brick, and
you treat them as if they were bringing in wedding presents.
Becky is as rough as sandpaper, and shell clear out a lot of
dead wood. OMally rose, and tapped Ardessas shrinking
shoulder. Now, be a sport and go through with it, Miss
Devine. Ill see that you dont lose. Henderson thinks youll
refuse to do his work, so I want you to get moved in there
before he comes back from lunch. Ive had a desk put in his
office for you. Miss Kalski is in the bookkeepers room half
the time now.
Rena Kalski was amazed that afternoon when a line
of office boys entered, carrying Miss Devines effects, and
when Ardessa herself coldly followed them. After Ardessa
had arranged her desk, Miss Kalski went over to her and
told her about some matters of routine very good-naturedly.
Ardessa looked pretty badly shaken up, and Rena bore no
grudges.
When you want the dope on the correspondence with the
paper men, dont bother to look it up. Ive got it all in my
head, and I can save time for you. If he wants you to go over
the printing bills every week, youd better let me help you
with that for a while. I can stay almost any afternoon. Its
quite a trick to figure out the plates and over-time charges till
you get used to it. Ive worked out a quick method that saves
trouble.
When Henderson came in at three he found Ardessa, chilly,
but civil, awaiting his instructions. He knew she disapproved
of his tastes and his manners, but he didnt mind. What interested
and amused him was that Rena Kalski, whom he
had always thought as cold-blooded as an adding-machine,
seemed to be making a hair-mattress of herself to break Ardessas
fall.
At five oclock, when Ardessa rose to go, the business manager
said breezily:
See you at nine in the morning, Miss Devine. We begin on
the stroke.
Ardessa faded out of the door, and Miss Kalskis slender
back squirmed with amusement.
I never thought to hear such words spoken, she admitted;
but I guess shell limber up all right. The atmosphere is
bad over there. They get moldy.
After the next monthly luncheon of the heads of departments,
OMally said to Henderson, as he feed the coat-boy:
By the way, how are you making it with the bartered
bride?
Henderson smashed on his Panama as he said:
Any time you want her back, dont be delicate.
But OMally shook his red head and laughed.
Oh, Im no Indian giver!
Century, May 1918
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