“But, my dear Miss Ayer, you are not the only young lady in this city who has been through such experiences. If women will invade industry, they must take the consequences. Actresses, shopgirls, woman-buyers accept these things as a matter of course—as all in the day’s work. Indeed, many stenographers complain of unpleasant experiences. You have been exceedingly fortunate. Have we not in this office paid you every possible respect?”
“Of course you have! It is because you have been so kind that I came to you at once, hoping ... believing ... that you would understand. It never occurred to me that you....”
“Of course I understand,” Mr. Warner insisted, in his most soothing tone. “It’s all very dreadful. What I am trying to point out to you is that whatever you do or wherever you go in a great city, the same thing is likely to happen. I am trying to prove to you that you are especially protected here. You like your work, don’t you?”
“I love it!” Susannah protested with fervor.
“Then I think you will do well to ignore the incident. Come, my child,”—Mr. Warner was now a combination of guiding pastor and admonishing parent,—“forget this deplorable incident. When Mr. Cowler comes in this afternoon, meet him as though nothing had happened. Undoubtedly he is now bitterly regretting his mistake. Unquestionably he will apologize. And the next time he asks you to go out with him, he will have learned how to treat a young lady so admirable and estimable, and you can accept his invitation with an untroubled spirit.”
“If I meet Mr. Cowler I will treat him exactly as though nothing had happened,” Susannah declared steadily. “I mean that upon meeting him I will bow. I will even—if you ask it—give him any information he may want about the business. But as to going anywhere with him again—I must decline absolutely.”
“But that is one of the services which we shall have to demand from time to time. Clients come to town. They want an attractive young lady, a lady who will be a credit to them—a description which, I may say, perfectly applies to you—to accompany them about the city. That will be a part of your duties in future. Had the occasion arisen before, it would have been a part of your duties in the past. If Mr. Cowler asks you again to accompany him for the evening, we shall expect you to go.”
“You never told me,” said Susannah after a perceptible interval, during which directly and piercingly she met Mr. Warner’s gentle gaze, “that you expected this sort of thing.”
“My dear young lady,” replied Mr. Warner with a kind of bland elegance, “I am very sorry if I did not make that clear.”