The Coolidge examiner. [volume] (Coolidge, Ariz.) 1930-current, 1933-11-17

wNU Service
\ EE HARLEY sold shoes in
Stone and Bumstead's base
- ment.
1t wasn't a very interesting job,
perhaps.
Cheap shoes. An anxious bargain
hunting crowd. Not a very pleasant
combination on Saturday afternoon.
But Lee was young and pretty
and, in one way and another, she
found life very well worth the liv
ing.
She was an orphan and was alone
in the big city.
But she had a most congenial
sort of home with Mrs. Flanagan
"a motherly woman whose children
were all grown up and in homes
of their own and who, to fill her
time and her pocketbook, rented
rooms and served meals to six or
eight young shopgirls.
This sort of home was lot more
to Lees liking than renting a room,
without meals, and cooking for
yourself.
It was something like the old style
boarding house-where the board
ers kept tabs on each other and
where them this case kindly
landlady dominated over every
body's destinies.
Mrs. Flanagan didn't need to
charge high rates to make both ends
meet nicely.
AS she said to one of her mar
ried daughters who protested at
the work she did: I'D keep the
house going anyway, darling, and
still be out of debt on what your
father left me.
But with what they pay me, I've
enough and to spare for lots of
pleasures.
IAN they actually cost me is their
food, and maybe a bit here and
there for lights and what-not."
So she gave them good food and
plenty of lights and what-not" for
figure that didn't eat up all their
salaries.
AS a consequence the girls who
found a place at Mrs. Flannagan's
were indeed lucky.
On the Saturday afternoon of our
story, Lee was hoping for closing
time.
Not because she was doing any
thing very exciting that night. Nor
the next day, for that matter. But
because of the copper-cOlor slippers
Once In while a pair of really
good shoes found their way down
stairs from the third floor shoe
department to the basement Of
Stone and Bumsted's
Slightly soiled or shopworn, they
were not quite right for the regular
department
They were thrown in with their
cheaper sisters in the bargain base
ment.
Like a refugee princess, perhaps,
buffeted by fortune into humble
life. where she must rub elbows, or
heels. with those of lesser origin.
The copper-color slippers had
come down while Lee was at lunch.
She had found them on the table
of tives. marked sos, when she
came back to the floor.
Lee had recognized their quality
at once.
Their soft finish, their fine luster,
their delicate llnes-all proclaimed
the right to expect a better place
in life than Stone and Bumsted's
bargain basement.
There was a rule at Stone and
Bumsted's department store which
extended to the salespeople the
privilege of buying anything they
chose in the store on Monday
mornings before the establishment
opened for regular business.
AS soon as Lee laid eyes on those
shoes she decided to get them the
following Monday morning before
they were grabbed up by one of the
usual horde of bargain-seeking Gus
toners.
She was making a dress-the girls
sewed together. sometimes, in Mrs.
Flannagan's big bedroom. using her
sewing machine and asking her
help-to wear TO the big Stone and
Bumsted employees dance the fol
lowing Saturday evening. And the
half-fnished dress would be made
perfect. Lee knew, If she had those
slippers.
Without admitting to herself that
she was doing it, Lee placed the
copper-color slippers under some
others. And all through the busy,
trying afternoon she found time to
look occasionally TO see that they
hadn't been sold.
AS the hours passed and a dull
CLEAN told her harried eyes that the
slippers were still on their counter,
her heart lightened.
Twenty minutes to closing time.