"Not the least trouble, I assure you."
"No, you're very good—but I'm in a hurry. I'll try somewhere else."
"Very well, madam."
A lost customer—no more to be done.
Yet the assistants had before their eyes a fine example of unflagging courage. Of one of the partners at least, it could not be said that there was supineness, neglect, or bungling practices to account for the long-continued and increasing depression that all the employees were feeling so severely.
Of the other partner, the less said the better. They could not indeed find words adequate for the expression of their opinions in regard to him.
When Mrs. Marsden, bravely facing the situation and calmly acknowledging the logic of facts, had declared that it was imperatively necessary to reduce what in railway management are called running expenses, and at all hazards bring expenditure and receipts again to a proper working ratio, the dominant partner selfishly jumped at the idea, converted it into a fresh weapon of destruction, and used it with wicked force.
Cut down the staff? Yes, this is a luminous notion. Where there have been five assistants at a counter, let us have three—or only two. "We must weed 'em out, Mears. No more cats than can catch mice! I'll soon weed 'em out."
It seemed to the people behind the counters that he took a diabolical pleasure in the weeding-out process. Instead of getting through his dismissals as quickly as possible, he kept the poor souls in suspense—giving the sack to two or three every day; so that these black weeks were a reign of terror, during which one rose each morning with the dreadful doubt whether one would survive till night.