Two of the most “refined” women in the store—­a forelady and a cashier—­had a few “swell gentlemen friends” with whom they now and then dined.  Once they included Nancy in an invitation.  The dinner took place in a spectacular cafe whose tables are engaged for New Year’s eve a year in advance.  There were two “gentlemen friends”—­one without any hair on his head—­high living ungrew it; and we can prove it—­the other a young man whose worth and sophistication he impressed upon you in two convincing ways—­he swore that all the wine was corked; and he wore diamond cuff buttons.  This young man perceived irresistible excellencies in Nancy.  His taste ran to shop-girls; and here was one that added the voice and manners of his high social world to the franker charms of her own caste.  So, on the following day, he appeared in the store and made her a serious proposal of marriage over a box of hem-stitched, grass-bleached Irish linens.  Nancy declined.  A brown pompadour ten feet away had been using her eyes and ears.  When the rejected suitor had gone she heaped carboys of upbraidings and horror upon Nancy’s head.

“What a terrible little fool you are!  That fellow’s a millionaire—­he’s a nephew of old Van Skittles himself.  And he was talking on the level, too.  Have you gone crazy, Nance?”

“Have I?” said Nancy.  “I didn’t take him, did I?  He isn’t a millionaire so hard that you could notice it, anyhow.  His family only allows him $20,000 a year to spend.  The bald-headed fellow was guying him about it the other night at supper.”

The brown pompadour came nearer and narrowed her eyes.

“Say, what do you want?” she inquired, in a voice hoarse for lack of chewing-gum.  “Ain’t that enough for you?  Do you want to be a Mormon, and marry Rockefeller and Gladstone Dowie and the King of Spain and the whole bunch?  Ain’t $20,000 a year good enough for you?”

Nancy flushed a little under the level gaze of the black, shallow eyes.

“It wasn’t altogether the money, Carrie,” she explained.  “His friend caught him in a rank lie the other night at dinner.  It was about some girl he said he hadn’t been to the theater with.  Well, I can’t stand a liar.  Put everything together—­I don’t like him; and that settles it.  When I sell out it’s not going to be on any bargain day.  I’ve got to have something that sits up in a chair like a man, anyhow.  Yes, I’m looking out for a catch; but it’s got to be able to do something more than make a noise like a toy bank.”

“The physiopathic ward for yours!” said the brown pompadour, walking away.

These high ideas, if not ideals—­Nancy continued to cultivate on $8. per week.  She bivouacked on the trail of the great unknown “catch,” eating her dry bread and tightening her belt day by day.  On her face was the faint, soldierly, sweet, grim smile of the preordained man-hunter.  The store was her forest; and many times she raised her rifle at game that seemed broad-antlered and big; but always some deep unerring instinct—­perhaps of the huntress, perhaps of the woman—­made her hold her fire and take up the trail again.