current, she noticed how it was constantly swollen by the
addition of tributaries, which trickled from nearly every door in
Oxford Street, till at last the stream overflowed the broad pavement
and became so swollen that it seemed to carry everything before it.
Here were gathered girls from nearly every district in the United
Kingdom. The broken home, stepmothers, too many in family, the
fascination which London exercises for the country-grown girl--all and
each of these reasons were responsible for all this womanhood of a
certain type pouring down Oxford Street at eight o'clock in the
evening. Each of them was the centre of her little universe, and, on
the whole, they were mostly happy, their gladness being largely
ignorance of more fortunate conditions of life. Ill-fed, under-paid,
they were insignificant parts of the great industrial machine which had
got them in its grip, so that their function was to make rich men
richer, or to pay 10 per cent, dividends to shareholders who were
careless how these were earned. Nightly, this river of girls flows down
Oxford Street, to return in an hour or two, when the human tide can be
seen flowing in the contrary direction. Meantime, men of all ages and
conditions were skilfully tacking upon this river, itching to quench
the thirst from which they suffered. It needed all the efforts of the
guardian angels, in whose existence Mavis had been taught to believe,
to guide the component parts of this stream from the oozy marshland,
murky ways, and bottomless quicksands which beset its course.

CHAPTER SEVEN

WIDER HORIZONS

Seven weeks passed quickly for Mavis, during which her horizon sensibly
widened. She learned many things, the existence of which she would
never have thought possible till the knowledge stared her in the face.
To begin with, she believed that the shabby treatment, in the way of
food and accommodation, that the girls suffered at "Dawes'" would bind
them in bonds of sympathy: the contrary was the case. The young women
in other departments looked down on and would have nothing to do with
girls, such as she, who worked in the shop. These other departments had
their rivalries and emulation for social precedence, leading to feuds,
of which the course of action consisted of the two opposing parties
sulking and refusing to speak to each other, unless compelled in the
course of business. The young women in the showroom were selected for
their figures and general app