During the continued ill health of the department manager, Mr. Rose still wielded an extended authority, and to him, accordingly, Jean made her appeal, overtaking him on his way to the offices one evening when the immense staff was everywhere hurrying from the building. The carpet and upholstery department, where they talked, was ever a place of muffled quiet, even with business at high tide, and, save for an occasional night-watchman, they seemed isolated now. Rose heard her out, lounging with feline complacency upon a soft-hued heap of Oriental rugs, while his eyes roamed her eager face with candid approval. Jean saw with anger that he no longer attended. "You are not listening," she reproached. "Can't you appreciate what this means to me? Look at my shoes! They're all I have. Look at this suit! It's my only one. I've saved no money to buy other clothes--it's impossible. You say I'm efficient--pay me living wages, then. I can't live on what you give me. I've tried and I've failed--failed like the girl before me." The floor-walker slid smiling from the rug pile. "She was inconceivably plain," he said; "but you--" He spread his white hands in futile search of adjectives. "Never mind my looks, Mr. Rose," Jean struck in curtly. "I am talking business." "So am I, my dear. I'm pointing out your resources." She did not take his meaning fully, his leer notwithstanding, and he drew his own interpretation of her silence. "You know we don't lack for applicants here," he continued. "There are a dozen girls waiting to jump into your shoes. We expect our low-paid girls to have additional means of support. Some of them have families; others--but you're no fool. There are plenty of men who'd be glad to help you out. Why don't you arrange things with that young dentist? Or"--his smile grew more saccharine--"if that affair is off, perhaps I--" Then something transpired which he never clearly understood. It was plain enough to Jean. In the twinkling of an eye she was again an athletic boxing tomboy, answering to the name of Jack, before whose scientific "right" Mr. Rose dropped with crumpled petals to the floor. XIII Jean stood over him an instant, her anger still at white heat, but the floor-walker had had enough of argument and only groveled cursing where he fell. Leaving him without a word, she swept by a grinning night-watchman and turned in at the adjacent offices, whither Rose himself was bound. She had learned the ways of the place sufficiently by now to know that members of the firm often lingered here after the army which served them had gone, and she was determined that her own story should reach them first. But the office of the head of the firm was dark, and the consequential voice which answered her knock at the door of a junior partner, where a light still shone, proved to be that of a belated stenographer. As she turned uncertainly away, Rose, nursing a swelling eye, again confronted her.