t diamond necklace! Isn't it wonderful! Do you
s'pose it's real?"

"Real! You bet your life it's real! You won't catch Burton and Norcross
putting fake diamonds in their window. Come along, for heaven's sake;
I'm starving and want my lunch. It's no use to hang round here staring
in."

"I can look, can't I?"

"If you want to, yes. Lookin's a cheap entertainment. You're silly to do
it though. It'll only get you out of sorts."

So babbled the crowd.

A listener might have amused himself the whole day long enjoying the
comments of the throng had he nothing better to do than loiter near by.
Unfortunately, however, the corner did not foster extended loitering. It
was far too busy a spot. About it swirled and surged an eddy of
shoppers, all hurrying this way and that and jostling one another so
mercilessly that he who did not make one of the current and move with
the stream was all but exterminated. Like a tidal wave, the ruthless
concourse swept past, bearing with it everything that obstructed its
path. You went whether you would or no, and afterward you stepped into a
doorway, caught your breath, straightened your hat, and tried to
remember what it was you had intended to do.

By contrast the interior of Burton and Norcross was painfully still. The
moment a visitor crossed its threshold he realized that. As if he had
left behind him a stormy sea and now come into quiet waters, he stood
amid its hush, conscious of his every footfall and the very intonations
of his voice. Instinctively he immediately pitched his tones lower and
drew himself to his full height when he traversed the marble floor that
separated the bordering show cases.

Individuals counted for more here than they did outside--far more. A
person who came into Burton and Norcross sensed whether his tie was awry
or his shoes unshined, and so did everybody else. For if you entered the
shop at all, you entered it deliberately. No one ever strolled or
sauntered into Burton and Norcross. It wasn't that sort of place. You
would no more have ambled aimlessly along its center aisle, frankly
proclaiming to all the world your opinion of what it had to sell, than
you would casually have invaded the Court of St. James or Windsor
Castle. Ambling was not done there. Nobody ambled. Even Mr. Burton
himself didn't. Although he was the senior partner and could have
claimed the privilege of ambling had he chosen, the shop transformed him
just as it did everybody else. Once