largest size, and then I gave her the business card and the ore sample.
“The man said that this is the greatest placer property the world has ever seen,” I said excitedly. “Do you suppose we should telegraph Mr. Webster?” Mary glanced at the card and with a bored look dropped both it and the sample of ore into the wastebasket.
“Mary Bard,” I said, “what are you doing?” She said, “I’m doing just what Mr. Webster would have done. In other words I’m saving him trouble, which is the first duty of a good private secretary. Now I’m going to pound a few facts into that humble little head of yours. In the first place you have two of the greatest assets a mining engineer’s secretary could possibly have. A, your father was a mining engineer; B, you have seen a mine and when Webster talks about an assay you don’t think he’s referring to a literary composition. The rest is all a matter of common sense and practice. Here’s the telephone number of the smelter, here’s Webster’s address. Open and read all the mail and keep a record of all telephone calls.”
“What about visitors like the fat man?” I asked. Mary said, “For a while you can keep all that trash and show it to Webster, after you get more used to things you’ll be able to tell the crackpots from the real mining men. Or at least you can pretend you can,” she added honestly.
“What about the home office,” I said. “They’re one of the richest corporations in the world. How will they feel about me?” “They’ll never know about you,” said Mary. “We’reboth Miss Bard and to the richest corporation in the world, a Miss Bard more or less at one hundred dollars a month in the Seattle office isn’t that much.” She snapped her fingers and we went out for coffee.
In spite of Mary’s vehement and reiterated assurance that I possessed the two greatest assets the secretary of a mining engineer could possibly have, I had an uneasy feeling that Webster’s reaction to a secretary who could neither type nor take shorthand, might be that of a hungry man who day after day opens his lunch box and finds it empty.
So, with feverish intensity, I tried to remedy the situation. I practiced my typing, I studied shorthand, I memorized the number of spaces to indent on a letter, I tried to remember which was the right side of the carbon paper and I prayed that Mr. Webster would begin every letter with weareinreceiptofyoursofthe, the way all John Robert Gregg’s business friends did.
Mary said it was all a waste of time. She told me to read some of the geology books, to study the maps, to thumb through the files and to try and get the feeling of mining. I suggested that I might buy a miner’s lamp and wear it in the office and she said it would go further with Mr. Webster than that scared look I put on every time I opened the office door.
I couldn’t help the scared look, I felt like an impostor, and as the days succeeded each other and the return of Mr. Webster grew more and more imminent, every morning when I took out my key and inserted it in the lock of the door marked menacingly CHARLES WEBSTER, MINING ENGINEER, I drew a deep quivering breath and prayed that Mr. Webster’s office would be empty.
Then one morning when I opened the office door there in Mr. Webster’s office, sitting at Mr. Webster’s big mahogany desk was Mr. Webster. I almost fainted. Mr. Webster had very brown skin and nice bright blue eyes and he called out, “Who are you?” So scared I had tears in my eyes, Isaid, “Well, ah, well, ah, I’m Mary’s sister Betty and I’m your new secretary.” He said, “Where’s Mary?” “Oh, she’s in an office right across the street,” I said, adding hurriedly, “She said that if you wanted to dictate to call her and she’d come right over.” He said, “This all sounds very much like Mary. Well, as long as she’s deserted me she doesn’t deserve the present I’ve brought her. Here,” and he handed me a
“The man said that this is the greatest placer property the world has ever seen,” I said excitedly. “Do you suppose we should telegraph Mr. Webster?” Mary glanced at the card and with a bored look dropped both it and the sample of ore into the wastebasket.
“Mary Bard,” I said, “what are you doing?” She said, “I’m doing just what Mr. Webster would have done. In other words I’m saving him trouble, which is the first duty of a good private secretary. Now I’m going to pound a few facts into that humble little head of yours. In the first place you have two of the greatest assets a mining engineer’s secretary could possibly have. A, your father was a mining engineer; B, you have seen a mine and when Webster talks about an assay you don’t think he’s referring to a literary composition. The rest is all a matter of common sense and practice. Here’s the telephone number of the smelter, here’s Webster’s address. Open and read all the mail and keep a record of all telephone calls.”
“What about visitors like the fat man?” I asked. Mary said, “For a while you can keep all that trash and show it to Webster, after you get more used to things you’ll be able to tell the crackpots from the real mining men. Or at least you can pretend you can,” she added honestly.
“What about the home office,” I said. “They’re one of the richest corporations in the world. How will they feel about me?” “They’ll never know about you,” said Mary. “We’reboth Miss Bard and to the richest corporation in the world, a Miss Bard more or less at one hundred dollars a month in the Seattle office isn’t that much.” She snapped her fingers and we went out for coffee.
In spite of Mary’s vehement and reiterated assurance that I possessed the two greatest assets the secretary of a mining engineer could possibly have, I had an uneasy feeling that Webster’s reaction to a secretary who could neither type nor take shorthand, might be that of a hungry man who day after day opens his lunch box and finds it empty.
So, with feverish intensity, I tried to remedy the situation. I practiced my typing, I studied shorthand, I memorized the number of spaces to indent on a letter, I tried to remember which was the right side of the carbon paper and I prayed that Mr. Webster would begin every letter with weareinreceiptofyoursofthe, the way all John Robert Gregg’s business friends did.
Mary said it was all a waste of time. She told me to read some of the geology books, to study the maps, to thumb through the files and to try and get the feeling of mining. I suggested that I might buy a miner’s lamp and wear it in the office and she said it would go further with Mr. Webster than that scared look I put on every time I opened the office door.
I couldn’t help the scared look, I felt like an impostor, and as the days succeeded each other and the return of Mr. Webster grew more and more imminent, every morning when I took out my key and inserted it in the lock of the door marked menacingly CHARLES WEBSTER, MINING ENGINEER, I drew a deep quivering breath and prayed that Mr. Webster’s office would be empty.
Then one morning when I opened the office door there in Mr. Webster’s office, sitting at Mr. Webster’s big mahogany desk was Mr. Webster. I almost fainted. Mr. Webster had very brown skin and nice bright blue eyes and he called out, “Who are you?” So scared I had tears in my eyes, Isaid, “Well, ah, well, ah, I’m Mary’s sister Betty and I’m your new secretary.” He said, “Where’s Mary?” “Oh, she’s in an office right across the street,” I said, adding hurriedly, “She said that if you wanted to dictate to call her and she’d come right over.” He said, “This all sounds very much like Mary. Well, as long as she’s deserted me she doesn’t deserve the present I’ve brought her. Here,” and he handed me a
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