David reeled away from the desk. That evening he and Tom celebrated the advent of the Impossible by eating twenty cents' worth of food; and his excited hope, fearful, daring, kept sleep from his eyes all night. He knew he was only a temporary man, but his hope reasoned that if he gave exceptional satisfaction he might be retained after the great post-Christmas discharge. If retained permanently, he might work his way up in the store; and if he could remain only a few months, at least he would then be able to say, when seeking a new place and asked for his record, "I worked last for Sumner and Company; I refer you to them." His hope told him this position might prove the foothold he sought--and he determined to exert all that was in him to make it so. Toward the end of his fourth day here, a woman for whom he had just laid upon the counter several packages she had checked two or three hours before, declared that a small parcel containing gloves was missing. Weary and exasperated from her day among the jostling shoppers, she berated David in loud and angry voice. He suggested that possibly she had not checked the parcel, that she might have checked it in some other store, that perhaps she had ordered it delivered and had forgotten it, that possibly she had dropped it. Nothing of the kind! She knew what she'd done with it! They'd been careless, and given it to some other woman! David, still very courteous, suggested that possibly it had been picked up and taken to the lost-and-found desk. She might inquire there. She would not! She had left it here! She had been robbed! She was departing ragefully, but David followed her and by using his best persuasion secured her grudging consent to wait till he himself should inquire at the lost-and-found desk. A few minutes later he returned with the package. She could say nothing more, for on the wrapper was the stamp of the desk and the hour the parcel had been turned in. She made a curt apology--it came hard, but still it was an apology--and went out. David had his reward. The superintendent over him, attracted by the woman's angry voice, had drawn near and looked on unseen. He now came forward. "That was well done, Aldrich," he said. "I couldn't have handled her better myself." David grew warm. Yes, this place might prove his foothold! A similar thought came to one of the other four men in the check-room. This man, a regular employe in the room, had recently been reproved several times for negligence and discourtesy, and he knew his hold on his place was precarious. The fear now struck him, at the great discharge might not he be sent away and this new man Aldrich be kept?