nd two
of the other girls liked best, the one that was in between in tone.

"I can get ribbon just this color, can't I?" asked the shopper
anxiously, once her choice was actually made.

"For the locket?" inquired Jessie.

"Yes."

"Sure you can. Suppose you just take this over to the ribbon counter
and match it right now, it's just in the next aisle, and then you can
bring it back to me."

Arethusa went away joyfully, bearing the shawl.

"Ain't you afraid, Jess, to let her go off like that?" asked one of
Jessie's contemporaries, of a more distrustful turn of mind. "'Sposin'
she don't come back with it? It ain't paid for, and she never told you
who she was."

"Oh, she'll come back," replied Jessie, confidently, "She'll come back,
all right. I ain't the least bit afraid. 'Specially when she looks as
much like an angel as she talks! I wish there was more like her to wait
on, and then it wouldn't be so hard to be standing here all day long.
Yes, ma'am, these shawls are all silk," to a personage who had paused
to examine the wares which Jessie had not yet put away.

It would be impossible to mention her in any way save as a "personage."
She exuded superiority and a consciousness of a high station in life
from every aristocratic pore.

"I doubt it. They look rather cheap." She tossed the whole heap aside,
contemptuously. "Have you nothing any better?"

"No, ma'am, these are the best."

"That's old Mrs. Bixby," whispered one of the clerks in a tone of
heartfelt awe to the girl next her, as the lady seated herself before
the counter. "And she is some swell, too, believe me, Molly Davis!
Money! Just buckets of it!"

Mrs. Bixby seemed rather disdainful of what Jessie had to offer her in
the way of shawls. She continued to toss them to right and left,
scattering them so carelessly about that one or two fell to the floor
of the aisle and were retrieved by a near-by floor-walker, who glanced
at poor Jessie, as much as to say, "Don't you let that happen again!"

"I see nothing here I'd really have," remarked Mrs. Bixby, at last.

Then as she turned, she caught sight of an acquaintance across the
aisle, who had loitered there hoping for the sun of her smile, to whom
she beckoned imperiously; and who came swiftly for whatever was desired
of her, at this nod, much as a menial runs in answer to the nod of a
master.

"I've got it!"

Arethusa came back with the shawl and several yards of rose-colored
ribbon that matche