be really
charming and also capable in business."

Emma McChesney dimpled becomingly.

"But I know a woman who is as--well, as charming as you say I am.
Still, she is known as a capable, successful business woman. She'll
be in Buenos Aires when I am."

Senor Pages shook an unbelieving head. Emma McChesney leaned forward.

"Will you let me bring her in to meet you, just to prove my point?"

"She must be as charming as you are." His Argentine betting
proclivities rose. "Here; we shall make a wager!" He took a card from
his pocket, scribbled on it, handed it to Emma McChesney. "You will
please present that to my secretary, who will conduct you immediately
to my office. We will pretend it is a friendly call. Your friend need
not know. If I lose----"

"If you lose, you must promise to let her show you her sample line."

"But, dear madam, I do no buying."

"Then you must introduce her favorably to the department buyer of her
sort of goods."

"But if I win?" persisted Senor Pages.

"If she isn't as charming as--as you say I am, you may make your own
terms."

Senor Pages' fine eyes opened wide.

It was on the fourteenth day of their trip that they came into quaint
Bahia. The stay there was short. Brazilian business methods are
long. Emma McChesney took no chances with sample-trunks or cases. She
packed her three leading samples into her own personal suitcase, eluded
the other tourists, secured an interpreter, and prepared to brave
Bahia. She returned just in time to catch the boat, flushed, tired,
and orderless. Bahia would have none of her.

In three days they would reach Rio de Janeiro, the magnificent. They
would have three days there. She told herself that Bahia didn't count,
anyway--sleepy little half-breed town! But the arrow rankled. It had
been the first to penetrate the armor of her business success. But she
had learned things from that experience at Bahia. She had learned that
the South American dislikes the North American because his Northern
cousin patronizes him. She learned that the North American business
firm is thought by the Southern business man to be tricky and
dishonest, and that, because the Northerner has not learned how to pack
a case of goods scientifically, as have the English, Germans, and
French, the South American rages to pay cubic-feet rates on boxes that
are three-quarters empty.

So it was with a heavy heart but a knowing head that she faced Rio de
Jane