“It’s damnable!” she panted, full breast heaving, throat swelling with stifled sobs, “to put this onto me!  Anybody with half an eye can see through the trick.  The Queen of England couldn’t get rid of these nasty rags at a charity bazaar.”

She went on without noticing the newcomer, except to flash across Win’s face and figure a lightning, Judith glance which seemed to pitch a creature unknown and unwanted into the bottomless pit where all was vile.  Her satin-smooth olive hands, with brilliantly polished coral nails, trembled as, gesticulating, she waved them over the stock which littered the four counters.  She seemed to be throwing her curse upon blouses, sashes, and ladies’ neckwear; and had she been a witch, with power of casting spells, the masses of silk and satin would have burst into coloured flame.

“Oh, Miss Stein, don’t feel that way about it,” pleaded a thin girl who looked utterly bloodless.  “The things are marked down so low maybe they’ll go off.”

“Look at them—­look at them!” broke out the Jewess.  “Is there anything you’d take for a present, one of you?  They might as well have sent me to the basement and be done with it.  But I’ll show him, and her, too, how much I care before the day’s out.”

So fierce was the splendid creature’s emotion that Win felt the hot contagion of it.  What had happened she did not know, though evidently the others did and sympathized, or pretended to.  But even she, a stranger, could spring at a conclusion.

Miss Stein was called upon to sell things which she thought no customers would buy.  Somebody in power had put her in this position, out of spite, to get her into trouble.  There was another woman in the case.  There must be jealousy.  This tigerish Judith was suffering as keenly as a human creature could suffer, and all because of some blouses, some sashes, and ladies’ fancy neckwear, which certainly had an unattractive appearance as they lay on the counters in confused heaps.

“He says, ‘it’s up to you, Miss Stein!’” the quivering voice jerked out in bitter mimicry.  “Up to me, indeed!  And he gives me this rag bag!”

“It’ll be nuts to her if you’re downed,” remarked a girl with a round, pink face.

“Don’t you think I know it?” Miss Stein demanded fiercely.  Her eyes filled with tears, which she angrily dried with a very dirty handkerchief that looked strangely out of keeping in the manicured hands.  “There’s nothing to do, or I’d do it, except to give him a piece of my mind and throw up the job before they have the chance to fire me.”

“You wouldn’t—­just at this time!” cried the anemic girl.

“Wouldn’t I?  You’ll see.  I don’t care a tinker’s curse what becomes of me after to-day.”