into the smaller room. The Power House, Fanny called it.

Fenger was facing the door. "Missed you," he said.

"You must have," Fanny laughed, "with only nine thousand
nine hundred and ninety-nine to look after."

"You look as if you'd been on a vacation, instead of a test
trip."

"So I have. Why didn't you warn me that business, as
transacted in New York, is a series of social rites? I
didn't have enough white kid gloves to go round. No one
will talk business in an office. I don't see what they use
offices for, except as places in which to receive their
mail. You utter the word `Business,' and the other person
immediately says, `Lunch.' No wholesaler seems able to
quote you his prices until he has been sustained by half a
dozen Cape Cods. I don't want to see a restaurant or a rose
silk shade for weeks."

Fenger tapped the little pile of papers on his desk. "I've
read your reports. If you can do that on lunches, I'd like
to see what you could put over in a series of dinners."

"Heaven forbid," said Fanny, fervently. Then, for a very
concentrated fifteen minutes they went over the reports
together. Fanny's voice grew dry and lifeless as she went
into figures.