II
One day Graves came to me with a beaming face.
“You know I don’t often express an opinion on an untried worker,” he said; “but this time I’ve made a find. I’ve got just the sort of girl I want in the office. She’s a college graduate; comes of an old Southern family—”
“And her father died, and she was obliged to go out into the world and earn a living,” I said.
He was amazed.
“How did you find out about that?” he demanded.
“She hasn’t had any experience,” I continued; “but ah, what class!”
“Now see here,” said Graves. “You’ve been talking to Miss Clare!”
“I know Miss Clare like my own sister,” I told him. “I’ve met her a thousand times. I’ve read her in books and seen her in movies—”
“Oh, that!” said Graves. “Well, you’re entirely wrong, you chump. She’s absolutely original.”
“I knew that,” said I. “She makes the most wonderful clothes for herself out of old quilts, and she can get up the most delicious little suppers for two for thirty cents—”
He laughed, with that disarming good humor of his.
“Well, I haven’t got as far as that yet,” he said. “I don’t know what she eats or[Pg 83] makes her clothes out of, but I can tell you this—she’s the neatest, most sensible-looking girl in the place!”
When I saw Miss Clare, I had to admit that in some ways she deviated from the usual type. She was what you might call a tall, willowy blonde. She had fine eyes, and knew it; but she was not kittenish, or pathetic, or appealing. She was doggedly in earnest. I liked her for that.
When I knew her better, I liked her for many other things, too. She was as honest and candid as daylight, and she left her fine old Southern family and her college and all her past glories where they belonged. She was there to work.
I was really sorry when the efficient Miss Kelly spoke about her.
“She’s stupid!” she told me, with fierce exasperation. “I’ve told Mr. Graves several times that she doesn’t measure up to our standard of efficiency. I don’t see why he keeps her on!”
“Beauty in daily life,” said I. “It’s what Morris recommended. She’s an ornament to the office, Miss Kelly. She has artistic value.”
“Superfluous ornaments have no value anywhere,” said Miss Kelly. “I worked once for an interior decorator, and I learned that. A thing must not only be beautiful in itself, but in harmony with its surroundings, and serving some definite purpose. She isn’t and doesn’t, and she ought to be scrapped!”
Now not only was Miss Kelly a notably good-looking young woman, and intelligent and alert and sensible, but she was infallible. Graves knew it. He had had other disagreements with her, and had always been worsted. Still, for a time, he defied her in regard to Miss Clare.
“D’you know,” he said to me, “I hate like poison to discharge that poor girl! You see, this is her first job, and it’ll be hard for her to get another, with only a four weeks’ record here.”
“Oh, no, Graves,” said I. “Not at all! After you’ve talked to her and pointed out her faults, she—well, she’ll get rid of her faults, don’t you see? And after that—”
Then Graves declared, with a sort of magnificence:
“She hasn’t any faults, exactly. It’s lack of training that’s the trouble. If she could stay on here a little longer, she’d do as well as the others—and better. She has brains!”
“Why can’t she stay?” I asked.
“Her output’s below the average,” he said dismally. “Miss Kelly keeps charts and so on.” He scowled. “Miss Kelly’s worth her weight in gold, and all that,” he said, “but she’s pig-headed. I’ve tried to explain to her that it’s actually more efficient to keep and train an employee, even if you have to shift him to another department, than to break in a new one. I’ve shown her in black and white what the actual cost of this eternal hiring and firing is; but no! She jumps down my throat with a lot of her own figures about what this Miss Clare costs the department every day. Hair-splitting, that’s all it is!”
Graves should have been warned, each time he opened his mouth, that what he said would be used against him. Of course this was. Each time he dealt the death blow, we reminded him of the cost of this eternal hiring and firing, and how much more efficient it was, and so on.
Miss Clare was shifted out of Miss Kelly’s department into another, which had a human man, young Allen, at its head; but he, too, rebelled.
“She won’t do,” he said to Graves. “She tries, but she’s—well, I don’t know just what the trouble is. She’s simply not on the job.”
“I’ll have a talk with her,” said Graves. “I’ll see if I can find out what’s wrong.”