But Mr. Bill did not wait to hear "why," he was hurrying to a pile of blue-and-white mixing bowls which half concealed a little clerk in the required black sateen. Her back was toward them, but they could see that her hair was pulled from her forehead into a tight knot at her neck and that she wore big amber goggles. She looked as if she might be a near relative to the Mary Smith they had found in the hardware. Joe Cary shook his head. That girl wasn't Tessie. Here was just another disappointment for Mr. Bill.
"He's only wasting time," Joe grumbled to Norah Lee, for if that girl was Tessie of course Joe would recognize her at once, and Joe could not see that she resembled Tessie in anything but size. Tessie never wore her hair like that. And Tessie did not have amber goggles.
"I beg your pardon," Mr. Bill said breathlessly, when he reached the black sateen back, "but would you be kind enough to remove your glasses?" But before the girl could remove her glasses, before she could do more than swing around and shrink away and blush and stammer, he had her hands in his. "Tessie!" he cried. "Tessie Gilfooly! I knew you were here!" His hands held her fingers tight as he repeated, "I knew you were here!"
"Tessie!" It was plain that Joe had never really thought that she would be there.
"Queen Teresa?" Bert peered over Joe's shoulder and wondered if this odd-looking girl could be pretty Tessie Gilfooly.
"Oh, Tessie Gilfooly!" Norah was as sure as Mr. Bill. "We have been so worried about you!"
"How did you know I was here?" Tessie tore off the disguising glasses and let them see her big blue eyes.
"I knew!" Mr. Bill told her quickly. "I had a hunch you would feel safer in your old job than anywhere else in Waloo. And you disguised yourself as a salesgirl!" He laughed chokingly. "And came back right next to the old job? That's a good one on Walker! He never recognized you?"
"You didn't recognize her at first, either, Mr. Bill," reminded the mortified Mr. Walker, who was hovering near. "And the crockery isn't in my department."
"I knew she was here!" declared Mr. Bill. "But it did take me a minute or two to find her. I never thought she would hide herself behind amber goggles. We hunted for you all night," he told Tessie simply.