“We ain’t to blame if they don’t give us help enough,” remarked Mr. Gunning, savagely.  “This firm is too stingy to keep a full force of clerks.  Still, if one of them is sick or dies, there’s always a row about changes.”

“Well, if she feels like it, she’ll report, and that will mean trouble,” said Miss Fairbanks, sighing; “but perhaps she won’t.  There are some good-hearted ones among them.”

“Who was she?” asked Faith as soon as she got the opportunity.

“Only one of Denton, Day & Co.’s spies,” was the answer.  “They are better known in the business as ‘Private Shoppers.’”

Faith looked aghast at this information.

“Didn’t you ever hear of them before?” asked Miss Jones, coming up.  “Why, every store has them; they are a part of the system.”

“Do explain!” cried Faith; “I am still in the dark.  Do you mean that that woman was a regular detective?”

“Oh, Lord, no; she wasn’t a detective at all!  She’s a spy, I tell you, the genuine article!  Her principal work is to trot around in other stores and learn all she can about their ‘specials’ and prices, and get all the information possible in order to keep her employers posted on what their rivals are doing, and besides that she is expected to prowl around this store at irregular intervals, and we are not supposed to know that she isn’t a legitimate customer.  She asks questions and pumps and finds out all we know; then she makes us take down all our goods and put them all back, just to see if we are in the habit of keeping our tempers.  Oh, she can make life miserable for us if she chooses!  A bit of indifference on our part, and up a report goes, straight to the superintendent, and we get bally-hoo from the buyer shortly after!  I tell you, we’ve got to be saints to keep our jobs in this place, but once in awhile, when we get the chance we let out on some safe party—­that’s the way we square ourselves.  We can’t always be angels.”

“I’ve got a lot to learn,” said Faith with a sigh, “but I shall always be civil and attentive to my customers, so I don’t think I shall have much to fear from that particular direction.”  At just that moment a messenger boy came along the aisle.  He had come from outside, and was looking for some one.

“Who is it?  What do you want?” asked Mr. Gunning, going forward.

“Miss Faith Marvin,” said the boy, loudly.  “I have a package for her.”

Faith looked up in surprise, as she heard the words.  She signed the boy’s ticket automatically, and accepted the package.

As she did so, a card dropped from under the cord with which it was tied.

Maggie Brady, who was watching her closely, sprang forward and snatched it up in an instant.  As she laid it on the counter she fairly trembled with rage.

She had read the words which were written on the card.

They were simply:  “To Miss Marvin, with the compliments of Jas. T.
Denton.”