The Man Who Bought London | Page 6

clenched teeth, "I will find
a bullet that goes to its mark--and the girl from Denver City will be
free!"

CHAPTER III
Mr. Tack stood by the cashier's desk in the ready-made department. He
wore upon his face the pained look of one who had set himself the
pleasant task of being disagreeable, and yet feared the absence of
opportunity.
"She won't come; we'll get a wire at eleven, saying she's ill, or her
mother has been taken to the infirmary," he said bitterly, and three
sycophantic shop-walkers, immaculately attired in the most perfect
fitting of frock-coats who stood at a respectful distance, said in audible
tones that it was really disgraceful.
They would have laughed at Mr. Tack's comment on the sick mother,
but they weren't sure whether he wanted them to laugh, because Mr.
Tack was a strict Churchman, and usually regarded sickness as part and
parcel of the solemn ritual of life.
"She goes on Saturday week--whatever happens," said Mr. Tack grimly,
and examined his watch. "She would go at once if it wasn't for the fact
that I can'tget anybody to take her place at a minute's notice." One of
the shop-walkers, feeling by reason of his seniority of service that
something was expected from him, remarked that he did not know what
things were coming to.
It was to this unhappy group that Elsie Marion, flushed and a little
breathless, came in haste from the stuffy dressing-room which Tack
and Brighton's provided for their female employees.
"I'm so sorry!" she said, as she opened the glass-panelled door of the
cash rostrum and swung herself up to the high stool.
Mr. Tack looked at her. There he stood, as she had predicted, his gold
chronometer in his hand, the doom on his face, an oppressive figure.
"Nine o'clock I was here, miss," he said.
She made no reply, opening her desk, and taking out the check pads

and the spikes of her craft.
"Nine o'clock I was here, miss," repeated the patient Mr. Tack--who
was far from patient, being, in fact, in a white heat of temper.
"I'm very sorry!" she repeated.
A young man had strolled into the store, and since the officials
responsible for piloting him to the counter of his desire were at that
moment forming an admiring audience about Mr. Tack, he was allowed
to wander aimlessly. He was a bright boy, in a fawn dustcoat, and his
soft felt hat was stuck on the back of his head. He had all the
savoir-faire and the careless confidence which is associated with one
profession in the world--and one only. He drew nearer to the little
group, having no false sense of modesty.
"You are sorry!" said Mr. Tack with great restraint. He was a stout little
man with a shiny bald head and a heavy, yellow moustache. "You are
sorry! Well, that's a comfort! You've absolutely set the rules--my
rules--at defiance. You have ignored my special request to be here at
nine o'clock--and you're sorry!"
Still the girl made no reply, but the young man in the soft felt hat was
intensely interested.
"If I can get here, Miss Marion, you can get here!" said Mr. Tack.
"I'm very sorry," said the girl again. "I overslept. As it is, I have come
without any breakfast."
"I could get up in time," went on Mr. Tack.
Elsie Marion turned on him, her patience exhausted. This was his
way--he would nag from now till she left, and she wanted to see the end
of it. She scented dismissal, anyway.
"What do you think I care?" she asked, stung to wrath, "about what
time you got up? You're horribly old compared to me; you eat more

than I, and you haven't my digestion. You get up because you can't
sleep, probably. I sleep because I can't get up."
It was a speech foreign to her nature, but she was stung to resentment.
Mr. Tack was dumbfounded. Here were at least six statements, many of
them unthinkably outrageous, which called for reprimand.
"You're discharged," he snorted. The girl slipped down from her stool,
very white of face.
"Not now--not now!" said Mr. Tack hastily. "You take a week's notice
from Saturday."
"I'd rather go now," she said quietly.
"You'll stay to suit my convenience," breathed Mr. Tack, "and then you
will be discharged without a character."
She climbed back to her stool, strangely elated.
"Then you've got to stop nagging me," she said boldly. "I'll do
whatever it is my duty to do, but I won't be bullied. I don't want your
linen-draper's sarcasms," she went on recklessly, encouraged by the
sympathetic smile of the young man in the soft felt hat, who was now
an unabashed member of the audience, "and I won't have your
ponderous rebukes. You