in the world. Una had
just been informed by Mr. Wilkins that, while he had an almost paternal
desire to see her successful financially and otherwise, he could never
pay her more than fifteen dollars a week. He used a favorite phrase of
commuting captains of commerce: "Personally, I'd be glad to pay you
more, but fifteen is all the position is worth." She tried to persuade
him that there is no position which cannot be made "worth more." He
promised to "think it over." He was still taking a few months to think
it over--while her Saturday pay-envelope remained as thin as ever--when
Bessie Kraker resigned, to marry a mattress-renovator, and in Bessie's
place Mr. Wilkins engaged a tall, beautiful blonde, who was too much of
a lady to take orders from Una. This wrecked Una's little office home,
and she was inspired to write to Mr. S. Herbert Ross at Pemberton's,
telling him what a wise, good, noble, efficient man he was, and how much
of a privilege it would be to become his secretary. She felt that Walter
Babson must have been inexact in ever referring to Mr. Ross as "Sherbet
Souse."

Mr. Ross disregarded her letter for ten days, then so urgently
telephoned her to come and see him that she took a taxicab clear to the
Pemberton Building in Long Island City. After paying a week's lunch
money for the taxicab, it was rather hard to discover why Mr. Ross had
been quite so urgent. He rolled about his magnificent mahogany and
tapestry office, looked out of the window at the Long Island Railroad
tracks, and told her (in confidence) what fools all the _Gas Gazette_
chiefs had been, and all his employers since then. She smiled
appreciatively, and tried to get in a tactful remark about a position.
She did discover that Mr. Ross had not as yet chosen his secretary at
Pemberton's, but beyond this Una could find no evidence that he supposed
her to have come for any reason other than to hear his mellow wisdom and
even mellower stories.

After more than a month, during which Mr. Ross diverted himself by
making appointments, postponing them, forgetting them, telephoning,
telegraphing, sending special-delivery letters, being paged at hotels,
and doing all the useless melodramatic things he could think of, except
using an aeroplane or a submarine, he decided to make her his secretary
at twenty dollars a week. Two days later it occurred to him to test her
in regard to speed in dictation and typing, and a few other minor things
of the sort whic