Nancy smiled as she took the chair beside the desk which was usually assigned to her in her intercourse with her chief.
"I wish I felt that way writing a bad letter," she said. "But I don't. It just makes me madder with folks, and I go right on thinking things, and—and—it worries."
Elas Peterman shook his head.
"Guess you'll get over that, my dear," he said easily. "Sure you will. You're just a dandy-minded kid, learning the things of life. You feel good most all the time. That's how it is. You want to laff and see things happy all around you. Later you'll get so you see the other feller mostly thinks of himself, and don't care a hoot for the folks sitting around. Then you'll feel different; and you'll tell folks you don't like the things you feel about them."
He went on writing, smiling at his own cynicism.
Nancy leant back in her chair. His words left her unaffected. She was used to him. But, for a moment, she contemplated the dark head, supported on his hand, without any warmth of regard.
After awhile she glanced away, her gaze wandering over the luxurious furnishings of the room. And it occurred to her to wonder how much, if any, of the excellent taste of the decorations owed inception to the man at the desk. No. Not much. The cheque-book and the decorator's artist must have been responsible. This grossly Teutonic creature with his cynical, commercial mind, was something of an anachronism, and could never have inspired the perfect harmony of the palatial offices of his Corporation. It was rather a pity. He had been exceedingly good to her. She would have liked to think that he was the genius of the whole structure of the Skandinavia, even to the decorations of the office. But it was impossible.
The man blotted and folded his letter. He enclosed and sealed it. He even addressed it himself.
"I'm kind of sorry I had to break in on you while you were fixing those reports," he said, in his friendliest fashion. "But, you see, I'm just through with the Board, and we took a bunch of decisions that need handling right away. Tell me," he went on, an ironical light creeping into his smiling eyes, "you reckon you've set your finger on the real trouble with our dropping output. I want to know about it because the Board and I can't be sure we've located it right."
The sarcasm hurt. It was not intended to. Elas Peterman had no desire in the world to hurt this girl. A cleverer man would have avoided it. But this man had no refinement of thought or feeling. Cynicism and sarcasm were his substitutes for a humour he did not possess.