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Updated: June 24, 2025
There flashed back to her the illuminating bit of conversation with which Fascinating Facts had regaled her on the homeward drive that night of the tea. "Nice chap, Fenger. And a wiz in business. Get's a king's salary; Must be hell for a man to be tied, hand and foot, the way he is." "Tied?" "Mrs. Fenger's a semi-invalid. At that I don't believe she's as helpless as she seems.
Fenger, general manager, had been a long time about it. This heel-cooling experience was new to Fanny Brandeis. It had always been her privilege to keep others waiting. Still, she felt no resentment as she sat in Michael Fenger's outer office.
It was interesting to deal directly with those people, to stack one's arguments, and personality, and mentality and power over theirs, until they had to give way. But after that! Well, you can't expect me to be vitally interested in gross lots, and carloads and dating." "It's part of business." "It's the part I hate." Fenger stacked the papers neatly. "You came in June, didn't you?" "Yes."
He was the genie of that glittering lamp. Fenger about that." "Yes," pointing to a new conveyor, perhaps, "that has just been installed. It's a great help to us. Doubles our shipping-room efficiency. We used to use baskets, pulled by a rope. It's Mr. Fenger's idea." Efficiency, efficiency, efficiency.
"I guess you don't realize that out in front of this hotel there's a kind of a glorified taxi waiting, with the top rolled back, and it's been there half an hour. I never expect to see the time when I could enjoy keeping a taxi waiting. It goes against me." "I'm sorry. Really. Let's go. I'm ready." "You are not. Your hair's a sight; and those eyes!" Fenger put a hand on her arm.
"But I you know, of late, it's only the human side of it that has appealed to me. I don't know why. I seem to have lost interest in the actual mechanics of it." Fenger stood looking at her, his head lowered. A scarlet stripe, that she had never noticed before, seemed to stand out suddenly, like a welt, on his forehead. Then he came toward her. She raised her hand in a little futile gesture.
After all, what he said was harmless enough. His tone was quietly sincere. One can't resent an expression of the eyes. Then, too, just as she made up her mind to be angry she remembered the limp and querulous Mrs. Fenger, and the valve and the scarf. And her anger became pity.
It lacked paprika and personality. Mrs. Fenger was constantly directing one or the other of the neat maids in an irritating aside. After tea Michael Fenger showed Fanny his pictures, not boastfully, but as one who loves them reveals his treasures to an appreciative friend. He showed her his library, too, and it was the library of a reader. Fanny nibbled at it, hungrily.
"Of course you understand I know nothing about them. But it's too flowery, isn't it, to be good? Too many lines. Like a writer who spoils his effect by using too many words." Fenger came over and stood beside her, staring at the black and white and gray thing in its frame. "I felt that way, too." He stared down at her, then. "Jew?" he asked. A breathless instant. "No," said Fanny Brandeis.
Fenger, watching the light in her face, seemed himself to take on a certain glow, as people generally did who found this girl in sympathy with them. They were deep in book talk when Fascinating Facts strolled in, looking aggrieved, and spoiled it with the thoroughness of one who never reads, and is not ashamed of it. "My word, I'm having a rotten time, Fenger," he said, plaintively.
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