“You wish a position?” The woman had a nose like a hawk, and eyes that held no sympathy.  “What do you want?  General housework?”

“I should like a position as waitress.”  Her voice was low and sounded frightened to herself.

The hawk nose went up contemptuously.

“Better take general housework.  There are too many waitresses already.”

“I understand the work of a waitress, but I never have done general housework,” she answered with the voice of a gentlewoman, which somehow angered the hawk, who had trained herself to get the advantage over people and keep it or else know the reason why.

“Very well, do as you please, of course, but you bite your own nose off.  Let me see your references.”

The girl was ready for this.

“I am sorry, but I cannot give you any.  I have lived only in one home, where I had entire charge of the table and dining-room, and that home was broken up when the people went abroad three years ago.  I could show you letters written by the mistress of that home if I had my trunk here, but it is in another city, and I do not know when I shall be able to send for it.”

“No references!” screamed the hawk, then raising her voice, although it was utterly unnecessary:  “Ladies, here is a girl who has no references.  Do any of you want to venture?” The contemptuous laugh that followed had the effect of a warning to every woman in the room.  “And this girl scorns general housework, and presumes to dictate for a place as waitress,” went on the hawk.

“I want a waitress badly,” said a troubled woman in a subdued whisper, “but I really wouldn’t dare take a girl without references.  She might be a thief, you know, and then—­really, she doesn’t look as if she was used to houses like mine.  I must have a neat, stylish-looking girl.  No self-respecting waitress nowadays would go out in the street dressed like that.”

All the eyes in the room seemed boring through the poor girl as she stood trembling, humiliated, her cheeks burning, while horrified tears demanded to be let up into her eyes.  She held her dainty head proudly, and turned away with dignity.

“However, if you care to try,” called out the hawk, “you can register at the desk and leave two dollars, and if in the meantime you can think of anybody who’ll give us a reference, we’ll look it up.  But we never guarantee girls without references.”

The tears were too near the surface now for her even to acknowledge this information flung at her in an unpleasant voice.  She went out of the office, and immediately,—­surreptitiously,—­two women hurried after her.

One was flabby, large, and overdressed, with a pasty complexion and eyes like a fish, in which was a lack of all moral sense.  She hurried after the girl and took her by the shoulder just as she reached the top of the stairs that led down into the street.

The other was a small, timid woman, with anxiety and indecision written all over her, and a last year’s street suit with the sleeves remodelled.  When she saw who had stopped the girl, she lingered behind in the hall and pretended there was something wrong with the braid on her skirt.  While she lingered she listened.