Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 193, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 August 1918 — A Very Bad Moral [ARTICLE]

A Very Bad Moral

By JANE OSBORN

(Copyright, 1918, by the McClure Newspaper Syndicate.) "Say, : there’s a new efficiency man and he’s some looker,” commented the tall brunette in the “beauty parlor” of Heed’s dry goods stpre to the rathershortish, rather biondish young woman who was laying out her manicuring outfit at the table next to the tall brunettes. Charlotte Day, hie rather blonde, rather short, young woman, made no comment. “Honest, he’s stunning,” went on her companion. “I saw him when I went up to the stock room for nail files just now. He’s the real thing, I’ll tell you—none of your namby-pamby, pale-faced floor walkers, either. He never worked In a store before. He was a college professor or something and went In for this efficiency stuff. He’s going to give some talks on selling aqd success at noon hour. You don’t want to inlss 'em. The one today is called: ‘Know your customer.’ You don’t want to miss it —he’s certainly a dandy-looking young man.” Charlotte snooted slightly as a short cut to express her lack of interest In the new efficiency man in general and his good looks in particular. “Say, Fm through with this efficiency dope,” she said. “Ever since I came to this place two years ago I’ve been listening to that kind of thing. The man they had before gave that same idea of ‘Know Your Customer.’ I was just young enough and foolish enough- to take it all in, and I read uplift talks in the paper at night on ‘Forging Your Way to the Front.’ They all give the same advice. They say if you tend to your little job the best way you know how, why some day you’ll be head of your department, or maybe make a hit with somebody and get married to someone who’ll appreciate how hard you’ve worked and everything. Talk about knowing your customers —don’t I know every wart on that fat Mrs. Peabody’s old face? And

don’t I know just how many double chins that Armstrong woman has? Arid talk about being diplomatic—‘oh, yes, indeed, Mrs. Armstrong, the facial massage does make one dreadfully pale. Not that you would usually need any rouge, but .after the massage I’d better put oh a little. Oh, I’m sure you don’t usually need it.’ “And then this to Mrs. Peabody: ‘Just a little of this tonic, Mrs. Peabody. No, Indeed, It isn’t dye. Bui; this new electric treatment makes the hair look a little dull and you really need a little of, this tonic to bring out the natural color of the hair.’ And of course she knows and I know that It’s straight walnut dye. And that’s what I’ve been doing for two years, kidding them and studying them and saying what they want me to. Where has It got me? Yes, they smile at me and ask for me when they make appointments —but catch them doing anything more. Why, to hear these efficiency men talk you’d think that they were going to ask you home in their limousines and were going to introduce you to their families and get rich husbands for you, or that you were going to be buyer for the department or something. No, indeed,” concluded Charlotte, rising and smoothing her diminutive apron. “I’m through. Pm going to act just the way I feel like acting. I have a feeling that It will get me further than the other way.” So Charlotte abandoned her efficiency methods and proceeded to try different tactics. When Mrs. Armstrong came she bluntly announced the presence of an additional chin, and she referred to Mrs. Peabody’s hair restorntjve as dye In a way that made that lady blink with surprise., She told one woman frankly that she was ruining her hair having it waved so often, and another that she would look far better If she didn’t get the expensive “transformation” that bhe was thinking of buying. Then a well-dressed young man came to have his finger nails manicured, and Charlotte performed her . task with none of the customary play of small talk that was calculated to make the customers return. J “How do they look?” asked the man after Charlotte had put on . the final high polish. “If you really want to know,” com.rnented Charlotte, thinking only of her resolve to be perfectly frank, “I think they look like fury on a man. The way they were when you came in is the way a man ought to have his nails kept. Now they are shaped and pointed and polished till they look like a woman’s. Somehow you’re not the sort or man that looks as If he would go in for that sort of thing.” Charlotte noticed the young man’s eyes studying her face. - “Still,” hfe said, “it is rather bad business, it seems to me, for you to give that sort'of advice. Perhaps you are right, but your game is to get as\ many customers as ybu can for your store, Isn’t it?” “You talk like one o* those efficiency men," commented Charlotte, with a sigh, replacing her Implements in neat array on top of the table, and the man hurried away. Charlotte did not go to the noon-hour talk, although it was the first advantage of the sort that she had missed since her arrival in the store two years before. Instead, she took, a walk in as secluded a neighborhood as she could reach within walking distance of the Store. She breathed freer and deeper

than usual. She really felt, without knowing why, that -she had taken a step toward her own emancipation. What If she did lose her job? At least if Site dM.*|®mething might happen—there might be some adventure connected .with the next -One. and ta the rut she had been keeping for two years there was nothing but monotony. She thought of the toan she had just manicured. Really he hadn’t disliked It because she told him the truth. He had looked at her With interest. Sh«,bad at least surprised him and that was more than she had ever done to any other customer in two years. After the lunch hour, when Charlotte was summoned to the office of the new efficiency man, she thought only that perhaps he wanted to see all those who had not attended his talk. She actually did turn a little pale when she realized, that he was the same decidedly goodlooking young -man whose nails she had recently manicured. She noticed that the high polish had-been rubbed off. He asked her to take a chair beside his desk, and then he proceeded to give her a little talk on efficiency purely for her own benefit. It was an A, B. C lesson in salesmanship. He assumed that she had never heard anything of the sort before and assured her that if she. only plodded ahead in the way he suggested she would reap her reward. Success would be hers —she would work herself out of the rank and file, cte* ' Then Charlotte waxed eloquent in reply. In fact, she rose and stood over Mr. Avery Baker’s desk and her eyes flashed as she talked to him.

“Fm through with this efficiency game,” she announced. “I’ve been pegging away at it eve" since I came, and I’m shampooing the same stupid people and manicuring the same hands and getting the same wages and telling the same lies and hoping the same hopes that I was two-years ago. That is, I went on hoping I’d get my reward till this morning I realized that—that there just wasn’t any reward. What do you people mean when you talk rbout forging ahead? Tell me, Mr. Efficiency Man, where is the golden opportunity you’re always holding up as an incentive?” Mr; Avery Baker evaded the question as tactfully as possible and saved his reputation as an expert by assuring Charlotte .that her real trouble was that she was a round peg In a square hole. He said he had made a tour of the store that morning and had got his nails manicured not because he cared fbr high polish —she was really quite tight in Saying what she did, though It was very bad salesmanship—but to test the work of that department. He had realized that she had the wrong point of view and that is why he had sent for her. Now he knew she had ability and she was no longer to work in the beauty department. She was to be his assistant. She could talk extremely well-*-that she had just proved —and she could help him in his lessons in salesmanship.

It was only two months later that Avery Baker, after due deliberation, realized that his entire happiness as well as his complete efficiency depended on his marrying Charlotte Day, and Charlotte had In a measure decided that, were the opportunity to arise for her to accept a proposal from Mr. Avery Baker, she would hesitate only long enough for appearances’ sake. “You’ll have to admit,” laughed Avery, "that I’m some efficiency man. I found you unsuccessful in the beauty parlor and knew right away that you’d double my own efficiency and achieve my complete happiness if you became my life partner.” » Charlotte pondered a moment. “Still,” she said, “the reward didn’t come because I pegged ahead and did my best thfe way I’d been told. It all began the .day I decided I’d break away and forget the efficiency stuff. If I’d gone on as I had for two years I’d be counting Mrs. Armstrong’s chins and Mrs. Peabody’s warts.” Avery Baker looked quizzically Into Charlotte’s face. “Perhaps you ( are right. In yeur case perhaps it wasbetter to break away. But, Charlotte, dear, from the efficiency man’s point of view it is a very unsatisfactory moral lor our little romance.” '