Among these Dirk worked immune, aloof, untouched. He would have been surprised to learn that he was known among them as Frosty. They approved his socks, his scarfs, his nails, his features, his legs in their well-fitting pants, his flat strong back in the Peel coat. They admired and resented him. Not one that did not secretly dream of the day when he would call her into his office, shut the door, and say, “Loretta” (their names were burbankian monstrosities, born of grafting the original appellation onto their own idea of beauty in nomenclature—hence Loretta, Imogene, Nadine, Natalie, Ardella), “Loretta, I have watched you for a long, long time and you must have noticed how deeply I admire you.” It wasn’t impossible. Those things happen. The movies had taught them that. Dirk, all unconscious of their pitiless, all-absorbing scrutiny, would have been still further appalled to learn how fully aware they were of his personal and private affairs. They knew about Paula, for example. They admired and resented her, too. They were fair in granting her the perfection of her clothes, drew immense satisfaction from the knowledge of their own superiority in the matters of youth and colouring; despised her for the way in which she openly displayed her feeling for him (how they knew this was a miracle and a mystery, for she almost never came into the office and disguised all her telephone talks with him). They thought he was grand to his mother. Selina had been in his office twice, perhaps. On one of these occasions she had spent five minutes chatting sociably with Ethelinda Quinn who had the face of a Da Vinci cherub and the soul of a man-eating shark. Selina always talked to everyone. She enjoyed listening to street car conductors, washwomen, janitors, landladies, clerks, doormen, chauffeurs, policemen. Something about her made them talk. They opened to her as flowers to the sun. They sensed her interest, her liking. As they talked Selina would exclaim, “You don’t say! Well, that’s terrible!” Her eyes would be bright with sympathy. Selina had said, on entering Dirk’s office, “My land! I don’t see how you can work among those pretty creatures and not be a sultan. I’m going to ask some of them down to the farm over Sunday.” “Don’t, Mother! They wouldn’t understand. I scarcely see them. They’re just part of the office equipment.” Afterward, Ethelinda Quinn had passed expert opinion. “Say, she’s got ten times the guts that Frosty’s got. I like her fine. Did you see her terrible hat! But say, it didn’t look funny on her, did it? Anybody else in that getup would look comical, but she’s the kind that could walk off with anything. I don’t know. She’s got what I call an air. It beats style. Nice, too. She said I was a pretty little thing. Can you beat it! At that she’s right. I cer’nly yam.” All unconscious, “Take a letter, Miss Quinn,” said Dirk half an hour later.