Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 January 1915 — THE SALESGIRL TALKS [ARTICLE]

THE SALESGIRL TALKS

By CLARENCE CULLEN.

It was one of those loathly “matching” missions, undertaken, with direful threats in case of nonfulfillment, at the breakfast table that morning, that brought me alongside the ribbon counter of the great department store. Pour women were ahead of me at the counter. “ None of them appeared to know whether she wanted cerfte or aliee-blue ribbon. But they all seemed to be perfectly certain that the salesgirl, who had a great many puffs, an uptilted nose, and a certain self-pro-tecting manner of independence, was trying to put something over on them. Therefore they one and all spatted with her. The spats were unequal, because the salesgirl needed her Job. After going over the entire stock all four of theAwomen deeided that they wouldn’t buy any ribbon “I seen you lampin' them four pills,’’ said the salesgirl as she took my “matching" sample and studied it with tired eyes. “How would yuh like to stand behind here and let about * thousand of them pills a day heave Irish confetti at yuh?” “Irish confetti?" I Inquired, mystified. “Half-bricks—yuh’re on’y pretendin’ that yuh don’t get me, ain’t yuh? Well, there ain’t anythin’ in thiß thing o’ satin’ on the mourners’ bench; but along about this time o’ the afternoon I feel so clawed up by them pillin’ cats that breeze in here to take a' “ Inventory o’ stock that I get to thinkln* I’m flghtin’ the inmates of i~"Bide-ar Wee home. “Them four dolls didn’t skate in here t’ buy. They Just ambled along t. scratch. They’ve been V-wedgin’ through bargain-counter crushes all day, and they’ve picked up a peeve, doin’ that, that they’re afraid to tote home t’ their men-folks because they are hep that the men, when they hit the hall and hang their kellys up on the rack, are goin’ t’ be there with grouches themselves. ‘They’re not keen fr the kind o’ all-hand a medicine that the hubbydove’ll pull in case anythin’ is started. So, Just t’ get the rough edges o’ their peeves sand-papered down, they skid along here a little while before closin’ up time and begin t’ toss chunkß o’ loose asphalt at ua sunny-natured-look-ln’ dolls behind the counters. A lot of ’em pick me out because I’m there most o’ the time with one o’ them grins that got froze on my map by mistake when I first fell intuh this business and before I Jerried up t’ it that the grlnner is pie for them wimmen that wants somebody t’ pick on. ' “There ain’t no use chirpin’ about it, I’m crazy over my own sex. They make it Just about as peaceful for me as if 1 was on a battle field ten hours a aav. Sometimes I feel like I’m developin’ intuh a white hope. It used t‘ bp that I d let ’em hand me the harpoon oue after the other.- just as fast as they could nudge up t’ the counter “But four years of It has funneled the vinegar Intuh my nachully winsome disposition, so that now I take a slant at their wicks as they elbow along; and If they’re there with that I’m - goin’ - t’-push -vuh-one-in-the-chops glitter in their lamps, I feel myself stiffenin’ like somebody that’s waitin’ for & trolley car t’ hit him on the nigh end o’ the wishbone, and it’s all’ I can do t’ keep from tricklin’ back as good as they shoot in.

"On’y I need the eight-a-week, ■whereas that eight thing isn't gum change for them, so that they’ve got me sewed up before the gong rings, and they know it. So the best I get for mine is a ’casional little uppercut that I’ve gotta eat as like as not before the ambulance in the shape of the floorwalker comes up, whereas they can paste me ontuh the ropes and swing on me with both mitts. . "And they're hard t’ dope by just lookin’ ’em over, if yuh’re inquirin’ o’ .me. I get ’em right, as they sail down the aisle, about four times outa five. Then I head-on intuh one that don’t run t’ her looks, and I’m in Heinie. "D’ye think you can chart ’em right because they're there with one o’ them Dolly Varden smiles? I’m askin’ yuh that, because most men do. I ain’t . never cut the trail yet of a man that wasn’t a fall-guy for a smilin’ cat But I needn’t talk. I’m a mark for that stuff myself ev’ry once in a while, ‘TU wise yuh t’ one of the smilin’ kind that waltzed up to my counter day before yestiddy afternoon. She ■was a nifty-dressed, peachy-skinned dumplin’ of about thirty or so, that was togged like she had a man workin’ the day and night shifts both ends from the middle f keep her diked out in all the scenery fit f wear. “I wicked her smile when she was 20 feet away. It looked like the sun cornin’ out from under a cloud and shl|niaerin’ -on the water on the day youh're oound for Coney. Some dolls pull that kind of a grin all the time that they’re not sleepin’ just t’ give all. a chance t* pipe their pearly teeth. But this one’s smile looked t’ be on the level. .. "Tm goin’ t’ get alohg with this connin' fatty,’ says I to myself, as she swung for my counter. ‘She’S, a chatty little thing that'll be prattlin’ to me all about the newd of the day and askin’ me if I don't find the life of a salesgirl hard, and if I’m engaged, and if not why not, an’ all the like o' that Hi-bum! It’d nice t’ wait on a cheerful skirt just before closin’-up time.’ “That's a. bug with jnost of us, yuh know—f top ofl the day by waitin’ on

one that don’t bark at ua We hate t* break outa the. plant and steer for the ballroom with the coyote music in our ears, and that’s what it sounds like at the end of a long day when wc snag a piller to be waited on just before the big doors kre closed and we’re due to vamp. - - • ....

“Well, this one with the dimples and the fine double row o’ mother-o’* pearl tnolars and the sunny smirk that looked like the twenty-four carat thing plumped on a stool In front of rpe, and looked me right In the lamps with a widenin’ of her cutey grin; and I wiped the froze grin from my chart and smiled right hack at her, and It looked like a sure thing that we’re goin’ t’ be little playmates for the time, and get along like as if both of us had been, rollin’ the same hoop and playin' puss-in-the-corner together ever sines we begun f wear our hair In braids. “Does she run to form? Does she? Say, honest, I ain’t through yet pickin’ chiggers and burs that that sunnymapped doll tossed at me from her side o’ the counter.

“As soon as she opened her face I had a sudden, chilly feelin’ that I’d got her wrong, and that she was goin’ t* add her monniker t’ my list o’, mistakes in pickin’ ’em from their looks. “She had a voice that sounded like a creaky dumb-waiter cornin’ up when the Janitor is sore after one o’ them reg’lar nights. Her voice was no morn like her smile than a rubber plant la like a early lilac, and she was out for battle, murder, arson, and collectin’ the insurance before she’d been squatted on the stool nine seconds. “And all the time, get me, ihe wicked me just like the eye of a camera, and kept that smile workin’ her dimples.as if she was pullin’ down eight dollars a minute for that stuff.

“She wanted t’ match some mauve baby-ribbon, and I had the thing that answered t’ her sample uqder a microscope and a searchlight. Would she see It? Not bo’s you could observe it with the undraped optic. She told me, gazin’ at me with her homemade, mo-lasses-candy smile all the time, that my goods had a greenish tint, and was no more mauve than diluted watermelon Is Chinese yellow. “Then she added that if I tried f get a Job as a brakeman In a freightyard I’d get the toss for color blindness before I’d got more- than one foot into the examination room. “Smirkin’ merrily all the time, with the dimples ripplin’ across her chart like little wavelets on a still pond, she asked me how I had ever bunked a reg’lar store Intuh stakin’ me t’ a Job that called for color-matchin’." (Copyright.)