Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 129, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 June 1917 — THEIR TWO WAYS [ARTICLE]

THEIR TWO WAYS

Women Shoppers Show There Arei Two Methods of Killing a Cat One Gets Grudging Service by Sharp* Demands While Other Wine Salesgirl by Her Pleasant Word*. It was three days before Christmas. In many departments of Bolivar & Clark’s great store girts with tired eyes were trying, usually with patience, to serve the never-ending line of customers. In the gingham department, however, the clerks were having an easy time. Few persons buy ginghams at Christmas time. The girls, grown careless, were talking together, taking It for granted that any chance visltoi’ to the department was on her way to the sijk department beyond. So it happened that two women stood for several minutes in front of the seersuckers without being noticed. Presently one of them walked across to the group where Madge Harkness was graphically describing the Christmas that she would have if she had a thousand dollars to spend. Her voice cut sharply through Madge's gay tone. “I want to see seersuckers, and I have no time to waste. Will one of you come and wait upon me, or shall I call a floorwalker?” A hot color flamed in Madge’s face. She turned at once and began taking down seersuckers. She answered every question distinctly; there was not a thing with which her customer could find fault, and yet her whole manner radiated antagonism. When she took the order she shrugged her shoulders behind her customer’s back. “The old cat!” she said to Minnie Dixon, as her customer left. “I’d like to fling the seersucker at her head. I’d like to put her behind the counter to wait upon herself. Wouldn’t she be a sweet one? She’d be fired at the end of the first day.” Just then the other woman stepped up to the counter. She was a little, white-haired, old lady, but there was a twinkle in her eyes. She smiled into Madge’s sullen face with a warmhearted friendliness. “I hope you w’on’t mind my saying it,” she remarked, “but what pretty girls you have at this counter! Old ladles love to see them, you know.” For a moment Madge stared. Then she began to laugh, and the old lady laughed with her. “Of course, I’d have to give you anything you want for that,” she said. “Of course,” the old lady agreed, twinkling again, “I expected you to. But all the same,” she added, when her order was taken and she was turning away, "I meant it, too.” “Taffy!” Madge exclaimed as she went back to the others. -“But I believe she meant it. Anyway, it made you feel good. Who’d have thought an old lady like that would be so foxy 1” The old lady herself was smiling as she went toward the elevator, but it was a tender smile, for she really loved girls. And the interested bystander who had seen it all went on her way smiling, too. —Youth’s