Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1919-05-16

Ing proportions. and the bundle of bills
for future settlement grew and grew.
Mrs. Chivvis made a list of their
debts and tried to show it to Daphne,
but she stopped her eyes and ears inc
forbade any discussion that would
queDch her spirit.
In the swirl of her tasks Daphne
almost forgot Clay Wimburn. She
was too busy to care much. She had
no time to mourn. Clay was only n
among a myriad regrets, and his at
fairs could wait. Her business needs
could not.
Clay did not come near her. BE
spent a lot of money trying to get her
off his mind. He got a good deal %
his conscience, but not Daphne off hiS
mind. He longed for her especially,
too, because there came a sudden dis
aster to his schemes He was not so
rich as he had been. Indeed, he could
not be sure that he was rich at all.
Any day might smother him with
bankruptcy. This fear kept him from
Daphne, too.
The bouncing munition stocks that
were known as "war babies" had abb
ruptly fallen into a decline. The sub
marine that torpedoed the Lusitania
shattered Wall streets joy, threw the
dread of war into the United States,
and set every one to questioning the
problem of revenge and its cost.
The slump in the market came at
the most unfortunate moment for Bay
ard and Clay. Any moment of slump,
indeed, would have come most untime-
" for their ventures.
"Kip and Chivvis'' were making a
picnic ground of the shop. Behind the
soap-veiled windows they laughed and
debated on arrangements and price
tags and show cards.
Mr.. Chivvis, still out of a job, acted
as maid of all work and stevedore.
and grew so useful that they had to
put him out. And at last the moment
arrived when they declared the shop
OPEN, raised the curtain" as Daphne
/ said.
She waited with a stage-fright she
lIuu ~ 1G1L Ill 4bCOCA . l4COCOAs AN
was no lack of temperament in her
manner now. But there was no audi
ence. either.
At night Kip and Chivvis locked
their doors and went home, discOur-
aged beyond words and dismally
weary in the legs, also in the smile
muscles which had been kept at an ex-
pectant tension all day long.
Occasional purchases were made,
but unimportant. Kip and Chivvis
tried to learn what interested people
and what did not. They realized that
they had far too much of certain
things and far too little Of others.
They attempted to sell the deadwood
by marking it down; but it would not
move.
"What do the women care for
prices?" Daphne rallied. '"They are
spending some mans money, anyway.
They pretend that it's to please him,
but they know and we know that it's
because they hate each other"
, One day a great lady who could
hardly squeeze through the door
creaked into the shop and spilled her
| self into a startled little chair like a
load Of coal. Daphne felt that she was
about to die on their hands or ask for
an ambulance. but she asked instead
for an embroidered breakfast gown
from the window.
Mrs. Chivvis fetched it and the old
ogress clutched it from her, holding it
up to her nose as if to sniff it, but
really to see it.
That's it! That's what I've been
looking for!!" she wheezed. "Have you
got much of this sort of thingy"
"Oh yes"
"Agh, that's goodi My daughter is
marrying in some haste-a young im-
beetle who's going over to France to
run an ambulance. I'm Mrs, Romily.''
Mrs. Ch;vyis waited u~nperturbed for
further Identification. Daphne had
never heard of Mrs. Romilly, either,
but she gasped as If she had been say
ing her prayers at the shrine Of Rom
lily from childhood and now had been
visited by the patron saint, whom she
had recognized at once of course.
"Oh yes, of course"
Mrs. Romilly vas coughing on :
1--WE been to several shops, and I was
almost II. despair until / saw your
sign. If you could do a few things in
rather a hurry / fancy I could give
you q large-ish order. And If the
things were at all successful, / could
throw quite a little trade your way.
You're rather new, aren't your"
Daphne assented that the firm was
quite new. She brought forward an
order pad and stood at attention.
Mrs. Romilly had trousseaued a
large family of children and several
poor relations. She knew what she
wanted and what she ought to pay for
it and when it should be done. Daphne
took down her orders as if the little
room were the mere vestibule to an
enormous sweatshop where hundreds
of sempsters would seize the job and
complete it in a jiffy.
(TO BE CONTINUED)