have stood the drudgery, and the heartbreaks, and the
struggle, and the terrific manual labor.

She used to guy people, gently, and they never guessed it. Mrs. G.
Manville Smith, for example, never dreamed of the joy that her patronage
brought Molly Brandeis, who waited on her so demurely. Mrs. G. Manville
Smith (nee Finnegan) scorned the Winnebago shops, and was said to send
to Chicago for her hairpins. It was known that her household was run on
the most niggardly basis, however, and she short-rationed her two maids
outrageously. It was said that she could serve less real food on more
real lace doilies than any other housekeeper in Winnebago. Now, Mrs.
Brandeis sold Scourine two cents cheaper than the grocery stores, using
it as an advertisement to attract housewives, and making no profit on
the article itself. Mrs. G. Manville Smith always patronized Brandeis'
Bazaar for Scourine alone, and thus represented pure loss. Also she
my-good-womaned Mrs. Brandeis. That lady, seeing her enter one day with
her comic, undulating gait, double-actioned like a giraffe's, and her
plumes that would have shamed a Knight of Pythias, decided to put a stop
to these unprofitable visits.

She waited on Mrs. G. Manville Smith, a dangerous gleam in her eye.

"Scourine," spake Mrs. G. Manville Smith.

"How many?"

"A dozen."

"Anything else?"

"No. Send them."

Mrs. Brandeis, scribbling in her sales book, stopped, pencil poised. "We
cannot send Scourine unless with a purchase of other goods amounting to
a dollar or more."

Mrs. G. Manville Smith's plumes tossed and soared agitatedly. "But my
good woman, I don't want anything else!"

"Then you'll have to carry the Scourine?"

"Certainly not! I'll send for it."

"The sale closes at five." It was then 4:57.

"I never heard of such a thing! You can't expect me to carry them."

Now, Mrs. G. Manville Smith had been a dining-room girl at the old Haley
House before she married George Smith, and long before he made his money
in lumber.

"You won't find them so heavy," Molly Brandeis said smoothly.

"I certainly would! Perhaps you would not. You're used to that sort of
thing. Rough work, and all that."

Aloysius, doubled up behind the lamps, knew what was coming, from the
gleam in his boss's eye.

"There may be something in that," Molly Brandeis returned sweetly.
"That's why I thought you might not mind taking them. They're really not
much heavier than a laden tray."

"Oh!"