The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1926-12-09
Hope and Window
Decorations
By JOHN EVANS

| wanted TO 90, exclaimed Hope
Chandler when she had been called t.
the office Of the department store
where she had been working. The
manager had offered her an oppor-
tunity to try her hand at window
decorating.
| you show some aptitude in that
line and we like to give our en-
ployees chance in their own direc-
ton. 1t is better for uS-and better
for YOU" said the manager.
The beginners in this line We're
usually given a chance to try their
ability on the small windows that
faced the underground arcade leading
from one street to another.
I'm going to do q perfume window
tomorrow" she cried, gladly, to one
of her co-workers
'Oh-for the big drug sale?" asked
her friend. Great Step on it, kid.
You're coming on, all right
She worked hard on the window that
would display all the varieties of per-
fume that the shop was to have on
sale. She laughed at the silly names
on the fragrant powders and essences
and yet she knew that in the market
ing Of this kind of ware there was
much in a name. Kiss Me" and
FLOWERS of Love" sold by their
names, no doubt.
She was arranging pyramid of
ornately formed bottles in a lower
corner of the window when the top
bottle tumbled off its precarious perch.
Fortunately, it did not break, but it
tapped rather sharply the plate-glass
pane.
Dear mellow lucky!" breathed
Hope as she bent to see if the pane
had been scratched.
AS she did so, she observed, for the
first time, the slender figure of
young man dressing window oppo-
site her in the narrow tunneled pas
sageway. He had heard the knock Oh
the glass and was looking at her.
He, too, had seen Hope for the first
time.
Hope was embarrassed. Did he
think she had tapped at the window
to attract his attention? She con-
tinued her work with only an occa-
Sional surreptitious glance at the man
in the window. She had seen enough
of his face to know she liked him.
He was arranging cigars, cigarettes,
tubes, pipes, ash trays. Hope had
never seen him in the store. She Won
dered who he was.
That night when she left the shop
she saw him swinging along the street.
She liked him the more for his easy,
graceful manner of moving.
The next morning she looked at his
window. 1t was as artistic as anyone
could have made it and there was
something about the colorful schemes
In which he had arranged the slender
cigarette holders with the trays that
matched them that gave the casual
eye a sense Of harmony. Hope de-
cided that the young man was an
artist.
Without seeming pointed In her pur
pose, she inquired about some of the
other window dressers.
"Oh-you know we are having
good deal of work done just now by
students from the commercial art
school uptown. They want the prac-
teal experience and we-well, we get
it done free, gratis, for nothing"
fellow worker told her. 1.-The lad that
did the cigar window yesterday in the
subway store is one of them. No
tice it?'
Nearly a month later she was stand
ing looking at the first outside win
dow she had ever been assigned to-
She had put a great deal of thought
and effort on it and had raised the
shade on a stunning rainbow window
Of silks arranged according to the
new science of color. 1t was an
original idea She had taken groups
of colors from a book on this subject
and had made charts in the window
and labeled them as such so that
passersby might choose and study
their own colors, their influence, vi
brations, etc. The window was at
tracing much attention.
Pardon me-" said a voice at her el
bow.
%" said Hope, looking up into
the face of the young artist.
II must congratulate you on this
window" he was saying. Il have
asked about it from the management
and they told me you were outside,
now, they believed and they gave me
permission to tell you in person"
"You-you like it?' asked Hope,
timidly.
Its splendid, both in conception
and execution he said.
Hope was adding admiration for his
deep, rich tones to the already suffi-
GENTLY large list of things she liked
about this man.
II am director In commercial art
school and am, therefore, perhaps, not
an ordinary judge of such work. do
an occasional window just to demon
strate to the students that 1t is an
absorbing profession and one that is
far from ignificant-even in its
early stages
"Yes-I saw you in the subway
windows, did l not? l had dropped
perfume bottle and it tapped the
| glass L"