There she goes, running off with the story, as we were
afraid she would. Not only that, she is using up whole
pages of description when she should be giving us dialogue.
Prospective readers, running their eyes over a printed page,
object to the solid block formation of the descriptive
passage. And yet it is fascinating to weave words about
her, as it is fascinating to turn a fine diamond this way
and that in the sunlight, to catch its prismatic hues.
Besides, you want to know--do you not?--how this woman who
reads Balzac should be waiting upon you in a little general
store in Winnebago, Wisconsin?
In the first place, Ferdinand Brandeis had been a dreamer,
and a potential poet, which is bad equipment for success in
the business of general merchandise. Four times, since her
marriage, Molly Brandeis had packed her household goods,
bade her friends good-by, and with her two children, Fanny
and Theodore, had followed her husband to pastures new. A
heart-breaking business, that, but broadening. She knew
nothing of the art of buying and selling at the time of her
marriage, but as the years went by she learned unconsciously
the things one should not do in business, from watching
Ferdinand Brandeis do them all.
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