Publisher's Synopsis
Of course there are two sides to the question. Let us look at the other. We often hear"shop-girls" spoken of. No such persons exist. There are girls who work in shops. Theymake their living that way. But why turn their occupation into an adjective? Let us be fair.We do not refer to the girls who live on Fifth Avenue as "marriage-girls."Lou and Nancy were chums. They came to the big city to find work because there wasnot enough to eat at their homes to go around. Nancy was nineteen; Lou was twenty. Bothwere pretty, active, country girls who had no ambition to go on the stage.The little cherub that sits up aloft guided them to a cheap and respectable boardinghouse. Both found positions and became wage-earners. They remained chums. It is at theend of six months that I would beg you to step forward and be introduced to them.Meddlesome Reader: My Lady friends, Miss Nancy and Miss Lou. While you are shakinghands please take notice-cautiously-of their attire. Yes, cautiously; for they are as quickto resent a stare as a lady in a box at the horse show is.Lou is a piece-work ironer in a hand laundry. She is clothed in a badly-fitting purpledress, and her hat plume is four inches too long; but her ermine muff and scarf cost $25, and its fellow beasts will be ticketed in the windows at $7.98 before the season is over. Hercheeks are pink, and her light blue eyes bright. Contentment radiates from her.Nancy you would call a shop-girl-because you have the habit. There is no type; but aperverse generation is always seeking a type; so this is what the type should be. She has thehigh-ratted pompadour, and the exaggerated straight-front. Her skirt is shoddy, but has thecorrect flare. No furs protect her against the bitter spring air, but she wears her shortbroadcloth jacket as jauntily as though it were Persian lamb! On her face and in her eyes, remorseless type-seeker, is the typical shop-girl expression. It is a look of silent butcontemptuous revolt against cheated womanhood; of sad prophecy of the vengeance tocome. When she laughs her loudest the look is still there. The same look can be seen in theeyes of Russian peasants; and those of us left will see it some day on Gabriel's face when hecomes to blow us up. It is a look that should wither and abash man; but he has been knownto smirk at it and offer flowers-with a string tied to them.
