Then he chuckled, and again scrutinized me.
"That all the reference you got?" he asked.
I produced Mr. Campbell's, and as I watched him read it with a rather puzzled expression, I hastily produced Canon Evans's reference as to my character, which my father had sent me for the Y. W. C. A. O'Brien handed the letters back to me without comment, but he kept Lolly's card, putting it carefully away in his card-case, and chuckling as he did so.
"What do you know?" at last he said to me. "Good stenographer, are you?"
"Yes, very good," I eagerly assured him.
"Humph! How much salary do you expect to get?"
"I got ten a week in the West Indies," I said. I never even thought that that "free board" at the hotel amounted to something, too. Ten dollars was my salary, and so I said ten.
He hugged his chin reflectively, studying me, and after a moment he said:
"I wasn't expecting to take any one on for a day or two, but so long as you're here, and come so highly recommended,"—and he grinned,—"you may stay. Salary fifteen per."
"Oh, thank you!" I said so fervently that he got angrily red, and turned away.