She bought quickly and
shrewdly, like her mother. She even went to the Haley House
to buy, when necessary, and Winnebagoans, passing the hotel,
would see her slim, erect figure in one of the sample-rooms
with its white-covered tables laden with china, or
glassware, or Christmas goods, or whatever that particular
salesman happened to carry. They lifted their eye-brows at
first, but, somehow, it was impossible to associate this
girl with the blithe, shirt-sleeved, cigar-smoking traveling
men who followed her about the sample-room, order book in
hand.
As time went on she introduced some new features into the
business, and did away with various old ones. The
overflowing benches outside the store were curbed, and
finally disappeared altogether. Fanny took charge of the
window displays, and often came back to the store at night
to spend the evening at work with Aloysius. They would tack
a piece of muslin around the window to keep off the gaze of
passers-by, and together evolve a window that more than made
up for the absent show benches.
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