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 ed around him. Too many sweets bring surfeit. He looked upon Hetty Pepper’s homely countenance, emerald eyes, and chocolate-colored hair as a welcome oasis of green in a desert of cloying beauty. In a quiet angle of a counter he pinched her arm kindly, three inches above the elbow. She slapped him three feet away with one good blow of her muscular and not especially lily-white right. So, now you know why Hetty Pepper came to leave the Biggest Store at thirty minutes’ notice, with one dime and a nickel in her purse.

This morning’s quotations list the price of rib beef at six cents per (butcher’s) pound. But on the day that Hetty was “released” by the B. S. the price was seven and one-half cents. That fact is what makes this story possible. Otherwise, the extra four cents would have—

But the plot of nearly all the good stories in the world is concerned with shorts who were unable to cover; so you can find no fault with this one.

Hetty mounted with her rib beef to her $3.50 third-floor back. One hot, savory beef-stew for supper, a night’s good sleep, and she would be fit in the morning to apply again for the tasks Rh