There had been a great deal of demurring and discussion before she was allowed to try her hand. Mr. Kipps and Mr. Featherstone had vigorously opposed the plan, arguing that while Miss Sturgis had proven herself an incomparable secretary, there was no indication she would be equally successful in charge of the Mail Order Department. Walt Chase had built up a steady sale for the company’s publications, and had been, doing many thousands of dollars’ worth of business a year. Mr. Kipps and Mr. Featherstone shared the opinion that a woman was not competent to manage affairs involving so much money,—they were too large for the feminine mind to grasp. They contended, too, that she had had no experience in mail order affairs, and that a young man, named Owens, who had been Chase’s assistant for over a year, was his logical successor, and had been led to expect the promotion; it was doubtful, they said, whether he and Mr. Sparks, and old Mr. Harris and the one or two other men who had been under Walt Chase would consent to remain if a woman was placed in charge of them; this particular branch of the business had become exceedingly profitable and it was pointed out to Mr. Corey that he was in great danger of demoralizing it by permitting a girl to assume its management.
Jeannette had stood firm and resolutely pressed her request in the face of opposition which she considered stupid and which angered her. Mr. Corey finally agreed to give her a trial although it was clear he had his misgivings. But during the nine years in which Jeannette had filled the coveted position, she had amply demonstrated to everyone’s satisfaction her faith in herself to be warranted, and this in spite of the fact that Owens and Sparks had promptly resigned as predicted by Mr. Featherstone and Mr. Kipps, and for a time the work had been demoralized indeed.
Yet she triumphed, as she knew she would, and the ideas she had long cherished for conducting mail order campaigns had borne fruit. Last year she had the satisfaction of stating in her annual report that the business of her department had doubled in size since she had taken it in charge. It had been a long struggle fraught with interference and constant criticism of her methods. It had been particularly hard at first when Mr. Kipps supervised everything she did and vetoed some of her pet projects. He had hampered her in every way he could, not because he had any personal feeling against her but because she was a woman and he had no faith in a woman’s judgment. That was the way he had always treated Miss Holland; but now since Miss Holland had resigned and gone to live with her nephew in Brooklyn, he was willing at any minute to wax eloquent in praise of her extraordinary ability: ah, yes,—yes, indeed,—Miss Holland was a remarkable woman,—fitted in every way for business,—brain like a man’s,—wonderfully clear-sighted, excellent judgment; they didn’t “make” many women like Miss Holland,—she was the exception, one in a million!
Jeannette had to contend against such prejudice for the first year or two, but eventually she overcame it. Mr. Corey helped her whenever possible. She strove to keep the affairs of her department to herself and when forced to seek higher authority, made a practice of going directly to the President who had been the first to be convinced of her ability. As time went on, Kipps and the other members of the firm inclined to question her gradually allowed her to go her way. It had taken nearly a decade to win their confidence but there was satisfaction in the thought that at last it was hers, the victory was complete. Of course old Mr. Kipps would always purse his lips and frown dubiously about anything she proposed for he would never be completely convinced of her ability until she followed in Miss Holland’s footsteps, but Kipps was stooped and aged now and little attention was paid to what he said or did. The Board of Directors was satisfied with the generalship of Miss Sturgis whose monthly reports of sales and profits confirmed their confidence. When some other department reported a loss, or when business in general was poor, the Mail Order Department could be depended upon to show a consoling profit.
§ 4
One section of the sixth floor was Jeannette’s domain. She had tried for years to have her department walled off by partitions but the best she had been able to obtain for herself and her girls was a line of screens and bookcases. She had twenty-four clerks under her now, although the number fluctuated, particularly during October when the fall campaign was in progress. Then her force often swelled to over a hundred and the extra help was quartered temporarily in neighboring vacant lofts and offices, rented for a few weeks. She then had her lieutenants to superintend the work, which for the most part consisted merely of folding and inserting circulars in envelopes, sealing and stamping.
Her department was well organized; the work had been so systematized that it now moved with perfect smoothness. Old Sam Harris,—who represented all that was left of Walt Chase’s régime,—supervised the card catalogues; Miss Stenicke was in charge of the girls; the “inquiries” were checked and answered by Mrs. M’Ardle, while orders were entered and forwarded to the stock room for filling by little Miss Lacy. Jeannette devoted herself to the preparation of copy for letters, circulars and advertisement. This was the most important part of the work, and she believed her time and brains could not be better employed. She kept huge scrap-books in which she pasted circulars and letters issued by other mail order houses and spent hours poring over them.
§ 5
Her desk stood on a low platform and from this vantage-point she could overlook her department as a school teacher surveys her schoolroom. She prided herself she could tell at a glance what any particular girl ought to be doing; if ever in doubt she promptly summoned Mrs. M’Ardle to her desk and inquired. All the girls respected and admired her; they knew her to be fair-dealing and straightforward, though swift in censure where merited. She liked to have them think of her in this way and cultivated the idea.
“You’re conscientious and you try hard,” she would say in admonishing some unfortunate bungler. “I want to be just to you. In conducting the affairs of this department, I want to be as lenient as I can. I strive to forget personalities and think only of my assistants,—or perhaps I had better say ‘associates,’—as co-helpers in a big machine, each one functioning to the best of her ability at her particular piece of work. I’ve explained my ideas to Mr. Allister repeatedly. I want the girls in the Mail Order Department to be every one her own boss, to come and go as she pleases, and feel responsible—not to me but to the work.... I want to be a ‘big sister’ to every girl under me. I’m placed here to help, advise and direct, not to scold. But if you fail to perform properly the work assigned you, if you’re clumsy and careless and haphazard in your methods, then it is my duty to call the fact to your attention.... I want to be fair to everyone; I have no favorites....”