Endeavouring, most of them, that is; but even the shop-woman, tried as she is in the furnace, is not always pure gold. The young woman who stood near Hildegarde may have been too tired, or may have been ill; she certainly was rude. Hildegarde had taken her stand directly behind a plainly dressed, elderly woman, shrewdly judging that she would be likely to make some definite purchase and then depart, instead of fingering half the goods on the counter, as many of the customers were doing. The elderly woman was evidently in haste. She held up the black cashmere that she had been examining, and said, civilly, "Will you please tell me the price of this?" The question was repeated several times; the shop-woman, after one glance at the quiet, unstylish figure, turned her shoulder, and began to press some goods volubly on a departing shopper.
"Please!" said the quiet woman again. "I am in haste, and want to buy some of this. Will you please tell me the price?"
"You'll have to wait your turn, lady!" was the reply; and voice and tone were equally ill-bred. "I can't wait on everybody at once."
"I have been waiting fifteen minutes," was the reply; "and my turn has come over and over again."
That was enough for Hildegarde. She reached over the woman's shoulder, and rapped sharply on the counter. "Will you tell the lady the price of this cashmere, or shall I call Mr. Jones?"
The shop-woman looked up hastily, caught sight of two blazing eyes, and a face like white lightning, and quailed.
"I--I'm sure I was doing my best!" she muttered. "It's sixty cents a yard."
"If this is your best, you have no place here!" said the flashing person before her. "How many yards would you like, madam? You shall--oh! oh, my dear! Oh, Nurse Lucy, it is not really you?"
"Oh, my blessed lamb!" cried Nurse Lucy, "Am I awake or dreaming, I says to myself the minute I heard your darling voice!"
And the stately maiden in blue serge, and the gray-haired woman in black alpaca, fell on each other's neck, and fairly cried for joy, while the roar of the shopping actually ceased--for one moment. Then it rose again,--what did it matter to anybody, when a bargain sale was on, who met or who parted? And the two friends, holding each other fast by the hand, got into a quiet corner apart, in a haven dedicated to Marseilles quilts, which nobody was buying, and sat down on two stools, and gazed their fill.