etter be displayed.

"Black's grand on you," observed Myrtle. "Tones you down." She glanced
sharply at the gown. "Looks just like one of our eighteen-dollar models.
Copy it?"

"No," said Ray, still straightening petticoats and corset covers. Myrtle
reached out a weary, graceful arm and touched one of the lacy piles
adorned with cunning bows of pink and blue to catch the shopping eye.

"Ain't that sweet!" she exclaimed. "I'm crazy about that shadow lace.
It's swell under voiles. I wonder if I could take one of them home to
copy it."

Ray glanced up. "Oh, that!" she said contemptuously. "That's just a
cheap skirt. Only twelve-fifty. Machine-made lace. Imitation
embroidery--"

She stopped. She stared a moment at Myrtle with the fixed and wide-eyed
gaze of one who does not see.

"What'd I just say to you?"

"Huh?" ejaculated Myrtle, mystified.

"What'd I just say?" repeated Ray.

Myrtle laughed, half understanding. "You said that was a cheap junk
skirt at only twelve-fifty, with machine lace and imitation--"

But Ray Willets did not wait to hear the rest. She was off down the
aisle toward the elevator marked "Employees." The superintendent's
office was on the ninth floor. She stopped there. The grey
superintendent was writing at his desk. He did not look up as Ray
entered, thus observing rules one and two in the proper conduct of
superintendents when interviewing employees. Ray Willets, standing by
his desk, did not cough or wriggle or rustle her skirts or sag on one
hip. A consciousness of her quiet penetrated the superintendent's mind.
He glanced up hurriedly over his left shoulder. Then he laid down his
pencil and sat up slowly.

"Oh, it's you!" he said.

"Yes, it's me," replied Ray Willets simply. "I've been here a month
to-day."

"Oh, yes." He ran his fingers through his hair so that the brown
forelock stood away from the grey. "You've lost some of your roses," he
said, and tapped his cheek. "What's the trouble?"

"I guess it's the dress," explained Ray, and glanced down at the folds
of her gown. She hesitated a moment awkwardly. "You said you'd send for
me at the end of the month. You didn't."

"That's all right," said the grey superintendent. "I was pretty sure I
hadn't made a mistake. I can gauge applicants pretty fairly. Let's
see--you're in the lingerie, aren't you?"

"Yes."

Then with a rush: "That's what I want to talk to you about. I've changed
my mind. I don't want to stay in the linger