Finders Keepers

Sometimes when I'm vintage shopping, I make up stories about garments I see, contemplating their origins, life story and, where they've been whom they've seen, and why they were passed along.

So here we go with my anthropomorphizing.

She didn't dare sit down, all the way in on the streetcar, for fear of creasing me. I think her feet must have hurt, too, the shoes too were borrowed, as were the hat and gloves but she quickened her step when she saw the man at the door, unlocking it. He looked kind, but then so many did these days that weren't anymore.

"Mr. Lambert?" she called when she was a few steps away.

"Yes, Miss, may I help you?"

"I've come, sir, about the job. Miss Thompson’s job."

"As a secretary?"

"Yes, sir. I'm Patrice Parker. Miss Thompson recommended me. I brought my references."

Works of pure fiction they were, but certainly they proved she was an excellent typist and full of initiative. Miss Thompson, however, now Mrs. Smith, and on her way to the Far East with her new husband, had no idea the pale quiet girl who helped her mother run the boardinghouse was visiting her old place of employment today.

"Well, come in, and we'll see what we can do. You're up and about early, aren't you?"

"I'm an early riser, sir. I don't like to be late." She'd been up before five, to get the laundry and the breakfast well underway, while the boarders and her mother slept.

She waited while he locked the door again behind him. He motioned her through the reception area, to his office in the back. She tried not to gawk at the display cases. "Sit, please."

She sat primly, on the edge of her chair. She leaned forward to hand him the envelope with her references and watched him look through them.

"These all look in order. It's odd that Miss Thompson didn't mention you before she left, but I suppose when young girls are getting married, filling their old jobs for old employers is not on their minds, eh?"

Miss Thompson was no longer “young” a hailing distance of thirty-five, but then, Mr. Lambert must have been nearly sixty. Patrice herself was barely twenty-one and looked even younger.

"Well, with these, and Miss Thompson's recommendation, I think we'll take you on a trial basis, Miss Parker. You'll work from eight to six, Monday through Friday, and nine to twelve on Saturdays. In a few minutes, Mr. Martin in Personnel will be here, and you can get your timecard and all the necessary paperwork. We provide two weeks of vacation after one year of service but you must have good reviews.

"I understand, sir, thank you!" There was a tremor in her voice that touched the old man.

"Been out of work long?"

"Not long, sir. But I'm happy to have found such a good position. Miss Thompson — I suppose I should say, Mrs. Smith, now — said such nice things about this place." Miss Thompson, had, in fact, run down the place loudly, and frequently, and with a horsey laugh that set Patrice’s jaw clenching, but then again, Miss Thompson had preferred marriage to a widower with vague shipping interests and clacking dentures to an honest day's work. That was the kind of man you met in her mother's boardinghouse.

"I see Mr. Martin now. Go fill out his forms and introduce yourself as the girl who is taking Miss Thompson’s place." He dug into his pockets and produced a worn billfold. He opened it and took out five dollars. "Here's an advance on your first week's salary. Buy a pair of shoes that are comfortable. You'll be on your feet quite a bit."

"Thank you, sir."

He may have seen that she was wearing borrowed shoes, but he couldn't have known I was borrowed, too. She made it back to the boardinghouse in time to return me and the shoes before the owner, a boarder, knew they were missing. I wish I'd heard her tell her mother she wouldn't help run the boardinghouse any longer, that she'd have to find someone else to do the cooking and the laundry and to help evict the sobbing girls who'd lost their jobs, but I never saw Patrice again. A few days later my owner left San Francisco in the middle of the night to escape her bill, and we went back home to Sacramento.