hundred different types of people. That suggested
benignity.

Perhaps, thought Sadie, Meggison wanted to see how much the new girl
could stand. Perhaps he wished to "sweat out of her" all the work of
which she was capable, the full wage worth she could give to Peter
Rolls before casting her aside forever.

Or--it was just possible that, instead of exciting resentment she had
won his respect by "cheeking" him. That had been known to happen in
the most unexpected, though now historic cases. And girls who had
awaited their discharge had been promoted, mounting slowly higher and
higher over the bodies of those who fell by the wayside, until they
had become head buyers, receiving ten thousand dollars a year and a
trip to Paris every summer.

In any case, Win liked Toys better than Blouses, though Mr. Tobias
(whose hair "left off where it began," and who wore his eyes in bags)
was a very "different proposition" from Fred Thorpe, the kind and
handsome floorwalker who loved Dora Stein, yet was fair to her rivals.
If Tobias saw a young woman stop to breathe he came up and reminded
her that this wasn't a matinee--they weren't having a party that day
nor serving five-o'clock tea.

The girls, too, were often rough in their ways and pushed each other
rudely about. They were surlily suspicious sometimes and seemed
temperamentally unable to trust one another, but they were
good-natured at heart. "Snap and let snap" was the unwritten law in
Toyland, and though they all squabbled among themselves, if a girl
were ill or had bad news her companions were ready in an instant to
help or console.

They mimicked Win and gave her the same nickname she had gained
downstairs, "Miss Thank-you," "Beg-your-pardon," and "If-you-please."
But soon she found herself popular, and saw the girls, and even the
men, adopting the gentler ways she brought among them. They seemed
half unconsciously to fall into the soft manner they made fun of,
which was a score for Win. Besides, there was Cupid, and he alone, she
thought, would have been worth the move from Blouses into Toys.

Cupid was an errand boy, employed to run with messages from one
department to another; but, though in Toyland there were some dolls
larger, there were none more beautiful than he. His real name happened
to be Billy Slate, but he rejoiced in several others more appropriate
such as "Bud," "Christmas Card," and "Valentine" That of "Cupid" was
added to the list by Miss Child, who had