Page:Far from the Maddening Girls.djvu/85

 That was all. Could anything have been more simple in appearance? Well, I solemnly avow that the most intricate cryptogram was the veriest child’s play in comparison!

I will not dwell upon that most painful fifteen minutes at the notion counter. (They call it that because the girls behind it have more notion than you of what you want.) I knew what I wanted — though, to be sure, it did not turn out to be what Galvin wanted — and, after a brief but severe struggle, I obtained it. It was a shocking experience. Homer speaks of the “ever-laughing sea,” but I am in a position to show that, in the matter of laughter, the sea is a poor performer beside the girl at the notion counter. It was all very unjust, very unreasonable. How was I to know that all these commodities are numbered and measured in direct opposition to every law of logic? — needles and spool cotton by quality instead of quantity, tape by width instead of length, buttons by cards instead