“But––”
“If you speak of my hands, I’ll prove to you how strong they are. Besides, if I were out in the yard at work, I could keep a better watch for Nicky, and I could keep you better informed as to the troubles always brewing among the workmen.”
“But––”
“I’m strong enough for it, too. I’ve been taking a lot of exercise recently to get in trim. If you don’t believe me, feel that muscle.”
She flexed her biceps, and he took hold of it timidly in its silken sleeve. It amazed him, for it was like marble. Still, he hated to lose her from the neighborliness of the office; he hated to send her out among the workmen with their rough language and their undoubted readiness to haze her and teach her her place. But she was stubborn and he saw that her threat was in earnest when she said:
“If you don’t give me a job, I’ll go to some other company.”
Then he yielded and wrote her a note to the superintendent of the yard, and said:
“You can begin to-morrow.”
She smiled in her triumph and made the very womanly comment: “But I haven’t a thing to wear. Do you know a good ladies’ tailor who can fit me out with overalls, some one who has been ‘Breeches-maker to the Queen’ and can drape a baby-blue denim pant modishly?”
The upshot of it was that she decided to make her own trousseau, and she went shopping for materials and patterns. She ended by visiting an emporium for “gents’ furnishings.” 296 The storekeeper asked her what size her husband wore, and she said: