er thoughtfully.

"Good morning," said Oliva, and there was in her tone more of politeness
than friendship, for although these two girls had occupied the same
office for more than a year, there was between them an incompatibility
which no length of acquaintance could remove.

Hilda Glaum was of Swiss extraction, and something of a mystery. She
was good looking in a sulky, saturnine way, but her known virtues
stopped short at her appearance. She neither invited nor gave
confidence, and in this respect suited Oliva, but unlike Oliva, she made
no friends, entered into none of the periodical movements amongst the
girls, was impervious to the attractions of the river in summer and of
the Proms in winter, neither visited nor received.

"'Morning," replied the girl shortly; then: "Have you been upstairs?"

"No--why?"

"Oh, nothing."

Oliva mounted to the floor where her little office was. She and Hilda
dealt with the registered mail, extracted and checked the money that
came from the post-shoppers and sent on the orders to the various
departments.

Three sealed bags lay on her desk, and a youth from the postal
department waited to receive a receipt for them. This she scribbled,
after comparing the numbers attached to the seals with those inscribed
on the boy's receipt-book.

For some reason Hilda had not followed her, and she was alone and had
tumbled the contents of the first bag on to her desk when the managing
director of Punsonby's made a surprising appearance at the
glass-panelled door of her office.

He was a large, stout and important-looking man, bald and bearded. He
enjoyed an episcopal manner, and had a trick of pulling back his head
when he asked questions, as though he desired to evade the full force of
the answer.

He stood in the doorway and beckoned her out, and she went without any
premonition of what was in store for her.

"Ah, Miss Cresswell," he said. "I--ah--am sorry I did not see you before
you had taken off your coat and hat. Will you come to my office?"

"Certainly, Mr. White," said the girl, wondering what had happened.

He led the way with his majestic stride, dangling a pair of pince-nez
by their cord, as a fastidious person might carry a mouse by its tail,
and ushered her into his rosewood-panelled office.

"Sit down, sit down, Miss Cresswell," he said, and seating himself at
his desk he put the tips of his fingers together and looked up to the
ceiling for inspiration. "I am afraid,