ild rush of the
two-hour act was over. Miss Stein, without a word of appreciation to
the new recruit who had saved the day, went off with the anemic girl
to lunch. Two others left at the same time, and only a couple of the
old guard remained to hold the fort with Win. Three were quite enough,
however, to cope with the diminished trade. Customers, as well as
saleswomen, were thinking of food; and as the crowd in the shopping
centres of the great store thinned perceptibly, no doubt it thickened
to the darkening of the air in the famous Pompeian restaurant on the
top floor.

Most of the best "confections" in the hollow square were sold, and
Win was aware, as interest slackened, that she felt "rather like a
hollow square" herself.

There was a little "flap" chair turned up against each of the four
counters, and at ebb-tide of custom Win looked at them wistfully.

"I suppose we're allowed to sit down for a minute when there's nothing
to do?" she inquired of a plump, dull-eyed girl who was furtively
polishing the nails of one hand with the ball of her other palm.

"We're legally allowed to, if that's what you mean," replied the
other. "But we're not encouraged to. I wouldn't, my first day,
anyways, if I was you."

"Thank you very much," said Winifred. "It's good of you to tell me
things. I won't sit down, since you advise me not. But it is hard,
standing up so long, especially after such a rush as we've had, isn't
it?"

"Oh, if you think _this_ is hard!" echoed the plump girl, Miss Jones.
(Win noticed that the saleswomen called each other by name, though
officially they were numbers.) "You ain't bin three hours yet. Wait
and see how you feel to-night when ten o'clock comes."

"Ten o'clock!" gasped Win. "I thought we closed at six."

"We're supposed to shut up then, but folks won't go these busy weeks.
They can't be chased out. And _we_ have to stay hours after they
_have_ gone, putting away stock and--oh, shucks of things. Little do
the swell dames care what happens to _us_ once they're outside the
doors. I guess they think we cease to exist the minute they don't need
us to wait on them."

"I've always heard that rich American women took such an interest in
the working--I mean, in us, who work," Win hastily amended.

"Oh, when they're old or sick of their diamonds and their automobiles
they think it'll be some spree to come and stir us guyls up to strike
against our wrongs. But when we've struck it's just about t