"Yes."
She sat close beside Mr. Rountree scheduling, on the sheets which would go to the shops, the work on the Nucast order. She did it quickly and competently, with her fingers flying and her head alert and clear; soon Mr. Rountree ceased even his suggestions and merely waited until she had finished with a sheet, when he would pick it up and hold it at arm's length, studying it with his deliberate, farsighted eyes.
"Very good," he approved her.
It was the week when all orders were scheduled and estimates made for the next year; and, in spite of this excellent order from the east, the schedule was scant; for two big pieces of western business, which had been with Rountree last winter, had gone to the Slengels; and, as Di had warned Ellen, the Metten account was uncertain.
"Sam Metten, who does the buying, is strongly influenced toward Slengels," read the office confession, in Mr. Lowry's own hand, on the report sheet of this account.
Di, this meant; Di was "ripping it away"—Di, in her décolleté, upon Sam Metten's knees.
Ellen thought of Di here in the-outer office, tapping at a typewriter, with her mind never on her work, her fingers perfectly manicured, always, but fumbling. Her head (the inside of it) and her hands (the skill of them) held no threat to Rountree, though the Slengels employed her. Her loveliness and femininity and allure for men endowed her with a different power, when she ceased trying to be a working-girl and became just . . . woman.
There were several men to whom Ellen was attractive not for the competency of her hands and head, but for
