ident of a
university is here talking over editorial matters, and such clothes
as you have on to-day would make a bad impression. Nearly all our
connections are with important people of that kind, and we ought to
be well, but quietly, dressed."

"Yes, Miss Devine. Thank you," Becky gasped and disappeared. Heaven
knew she had no need to be further impressed with the greatness of
"The Outcry" office. During the year and a half she had been there
she had never ceased to tremble. She knew the prices all the authors
got as well as Miss Devine did, and everything seemed to her to be
done on a magnificent scale. She hadn't a good memory for long
technical words, but she never forgot dates or prices or initials or
telephone numbers.

Becky felt that her job depended on Miss Devine, and she was so glad
to have it that she scarcely realized she was being bullied.
Besides, she was grateful for all that she had learned from Ardessa;
Ardessa had taught her to do most of the things that she was
supposed to do herself. Becky wanted to learn, she had to learn;
that was the train she was always running for. Her father, Isaac
Tietelbaum, the tailor, who pressed Miss Devine's skirts and kept
her ladylike suits in order, had come to his client two years ago
and told her he had a bright girl just out of a commercial high
school. He implored Ardessa to find some office position for his
daughter. Ardessa told an appealing story to O'Mally, and brought
Becky into the office, at a salary of six dollars a week, to help
with the copying and to learn business routine. When Becky first
came she was as ignorant as a young savage. She was rapid at her
shorthand and typing, but a Kafir girl would have known as much
about the English language. Nobody ever wanted to learn more than
Becky. She fairly wore the dictionary out. She dug up her old school
grammar and worked over it at night. She faithfully mastered Miss
Devine's fussy system of punctuation.

There were eight children at home, younger than Becky, and they were
all eager to learn. They wanted to get their mother out of the three
dark rooms behind the tailor shop and to move into a flat up-stairs,
where they could, as Becky said, "live private." The young
Tietelbaums doubted their father's ability to bring this change
about, for the more things he declared himself ready to do in his
window placards, the fewer were brought to him to be done. "Dyeing,
Cleaning, Ladies' Furs Remodeled"--it did