the vastly increased business of the firm. Here, in a huge room, were
bookkeepers, stenographers, clerks, filing cabinets, desks,
typewriters--with several cubicles glassed off for the more important
employees and minor executives.

"We have tried," said Rangar, "to retain as far as possible the old
methods and systems. Your father, Mr. Foote, is conservative. He
clings to the ways of his father and his grandfather."

"I remember," said Bonbright, "when we had no typewriting machines."

"We had to come to them," said Rangar, with a note of regret. "Axles
compelled us. But we have never taken up with these new contraptions
--fads--like phonographs to dictate to, card indices, loose-leaf
systems, adding machines, and the like. Of course it requires more
clerks and stenographers, and possibly we are a bit slower than some.
Your father says, however, that he prefers conducting his business as
a gentleman should, rather than to make a mere machine of it. His
idea," said Rangar, "of a gentleman in business is one who refuses to
make use of abbreviations in his correspondence."

Bonbright was looking about the busy room, conscious that he was
being covertly studied by every occupant of it. It made him
uncomfortable, uneasy.

"Let's go on into the shops," he said, impatiently.

They turned, and encountered in the aisle a girl with a
stenographer's notebook in her hand; indeed, Bonbright all but
stepped on her. She was a slight, tiny thing, not thin, but small.