“Miss Sturgis, c’n I have some pins?”
At a quarter past twelve she went to lunch. She made a point of going promptly. There was a time, some years back, when she had fallen into the habit of letting her lunch hour lapse over into the afternoon, allowing the demands upon her further and further to postpone it, and it had been two o’clock, sometimes three before she went out. As a result, indigestion and headaches commenced seriously to trouble her, and the doctor advised a regular hour for lunch. At twelve-fifteen, therefore, she compelled herself to drop whatever she had in hand and leave the office; one of the girls was instructed to call her attention to the time.
She always went to the Clover Tea Room for her luncheon. This was a little basement restaurant operated by two elderly sisters. It was prettily appointed with yellow lights, yellow candles, yellow embroidered table doilies and yellow painted furniture. Jeannette had her own special table daily reserved for her. Lunch cost sixty-five cents and consisted generally of a small fruit cocktail, a chop, a little fish, or an individual meat pie, with an accompanying dab of vegetable, and a dessert.
She was accustomed to enter the Tea Room at twelve-twenty almost to the minute: a tall, fine-figured, handsome woman in her dark tailor-made, her modish hat and fur scarf. She would proceed directly to her table, exchanging a smile and a word of greeting with the elder Miss Hanlon as she passed her desk. Unbuttoning her gloves and drawing them from her hands, she would study the handwritten menu:
Minnie would presently come for her order.
“Morning, Miss Sturgis; what’s it to-day? Stew looks good.”
“Good morning, Minnie. Well, if you say so, I’ll have the stew. And don’t forget to bring lemon with my tea.”
The Tea Room would be but partially filled when Jeannette entered, but as she waited for her lunch other people began to arrive. Ah, here was Miss Hogan of Lyman & Howell, and here was that pretty Miss Thompson of Altman’s; Mr. Crothers of the Stationers’ Supply was late,—no, here he was; Mrs. Diggs had that funny looking hat on again; this person was a stranger and that couple, busily talking, were quite evidently shoppers. A gray-haired woman in the corner appeared at the Tea Room several times of late; Jeannette decided she must ask Miss Hanlon who she was, and find out where she was employed.
At quarter to one or perhaps ten minutes before the hour, Jeannette would pour a little drinking water from her tumbler over her finger-tips into her empty dessert saucer, moisten her lips, wipe them on the little yellow napkin, and draw on her gloves nicely. She always left ten cents for Minnie and paid her check at Miss Hanlon’s desk on her way out. Usually she had the better part of half-an-hour before it was time to return to the office. Between the Tea Room and the corner of the Avenue, she almost invariably encountered Miss Travers, the Cashier, who likewise patronized the little restaurant. They would nod and smile at one another as they passed but neither had time to pause for words. Jeannette frequently had a small errand to perform: gloves to get at the cleaners’, her shoes polished, a bit of shopping, a book to exchange at the library. When there was nothing specially pressing, she would pay a visit to a bustling Fifth Avenue store, where she would make her way through crowds of jostling women, and inspect counters, examining, even pricing the merchandise that attracted her. In the long years she had been an office-worker, she had spent many a luncheon hour in this fashion; she never grew tried of such visits, nor of acquainting herself with the new fads, novelties and latest styles in feminine apparel.
Just one hour after she had left it, she would be back at her desk, readjusting her paper cuffs, and re-pinning the sheet at her breast. At once the demands upon her would recommence: