II
Mrs. Durland was greatly distressed that a daughter of hers should have met Miss Beulah Reynolds in what she was pleased to term a servile capacity. Miss Reynolds was a personage, she said—a Colonial Dame, a D. A. R. and everything else that implied noble American ancestry. Mrs. Durland had met her at a tea, which she described with minute detail. It was in Harrison’s administration, she thought, though it might have been in the second consulship of Cleveland. That a lady so distinguished and wealthy should have given Grace ten dollars quite as though she were a waitress was humiliating. Miss Reynolds would never have thought of tipping the daughter of Alicia Morley Durland.
“I’m number Eighteen to all the world when I’m at Shipley’s,” Grace replied good-naturedly. “If I’d told her in a burst of confidence that I was your daughter she probably wouldn’t have given me the ten which I sorely need. She was nice as possible and I didn’t see anything wrong in taking her money.”
“Well, of course she meant to be kind, dear; but it hurts me just a little.”
Thanks to Mrs. Reynolds’ generous purchases, Grace’s envelope for the first week contained $35.21. Though warned by Irene that this was beginner’s luck she was satisfied that she could master the selling art and earn a good income.
“You’ve got the gift, my dear. You’ll build up a line of regular customers,” Irene expatiated, “who’ll always ask for you, and that’s what counts. I notice that a good many customers already pick you out and refuse to be steered to the other girls at your end of the room. All due to your beaux yeux, as we say in Paris, and general air of being somebody in particular.”
Grace quickly made friends in the store, both in and out of her own department. Two members of her sorority, who like herself had been obliged to leave college before finishing, sought her out; an alumna of the state university, a woman of thirty, who was employed in the office as auditor, took her to lunch; a charming English woman, stranded in America and plying her needle in the alteration room, brought her books to read. Miss Vail at the glove counter knew all there was to know about palmistry, table-tipping and automatic writing and aroused Grace’s curiosity as to the mysteries of the ouija board.
To break the monotony of her evenings, Grace asked Miss Vail and two other girls from the store to the house for some experiments. She had not announced in advance that the purpose of the meeting was to probe into the unknown, and had counted on Ethel’s assistance in entertaining her friends; but when the ouija board was produced Ethel expressed a chilling disapproval of ouija and everything else pertaining to the occult. Mrs. Durland, anxious to promote harmony, suggested that they read aloud an article in a late magazine that explained ouija writing and similar phenomena. Of course Grace and her friends did not want scientific explanations of ouija; they wanted to see the thing work.
“Much unhappiness may be caused by such things,” said Mrs. Durland; “and of course they mean nothing.”
“I’ve always felt,” remarked Ethel, “that there’s something just a little vulgar about it.”
“Oh, piffle!” exclaimed Grace impatiently. “We all know it’s a joke; we just wanted to have a little fun out of it.”
“Don’t bother, Grace,” said Miss Vail. “We’ll just forget about it.”
Stephen Durland, who had changed his clothes in honor of Grace’s party, broke his silence to say:
“I don’t see any harm in those things. They’re all explained on scientific grounds. I think it would be interesting to watch it work.”
“It probably wouldn’t work in such an atmosphere,” said Grace, thoroughly irritated.
“Suppose,” said Mrs. Durland with sudden inspiration, “you girls make fudge! I’ll get the things ready. I never saw a girl yet who didn’t like fudge.”
Something had to be done to amuse the guests and Grace assented. Ethel, however, did not participate in the fudge making, but took herself off to bed. Grace resolved never again to ask any one to the house. She said as much to Ethel the next morning.
“You seem to forget that I pay my board here and help with the housework, too. I ought to have a few privileges. Those are as nice girls as I ever knew and you and mother drove us into the kitchen as though we were a lot of silly children. You’re certainly the queen of the kill-joys.”
“I should think,” said Ethel, regarding her sister pityingly, “that with your education you’d be above putting yourself on the level with the cheap people who patronize fortune-tellers. People who really have faith that there’s a life to come don’t need such things. They have no place in a Christian home.”
Grace stared at her helplessly. Ethel was an enigma; it was incredible that any one could feel so intensely about so small a matter, or find so complete a joy in making others uncomfortable.