Radio and television mirror (Jan-June 1950)

J One gets out of life exactly what one puts in ... so the saying goes. For Joe and Marsha, this was a dangerous philosophy. But then they made an important discovery investment, you saved so much on repairs. The country club did make her hesitate a little. You see, Marsha came of plain folks, the in-between kind with just enough for all their wants, but nothing to waste. Her mother's eyebrows would have gone up at the idea of spending three afternoons a week chattering over a bridge table. And her father had been pretty busy with his hardware shop. He got out for an occasional fishing trip, but he didn't play golf, and though he was a friendly man it would never have occurred to him to meet his friends in a bar, as one did at the club. But the business angle finally convinced Marsha — after all, Joe said, he was a salesman, and it was a well-known principle of salesmanship that you had to get* people to like you before they would buy from you. "Take them to lunch at the club," Joe argued. "Play around the course with them, let them rub elbows with all the best people in town, and let them see you signing all the checks as if you owned the place — why, you could sell anyone the Town Hall after that!" Well, Joe's salesmanship was good enough to sell Marsha on that idea. Afterwards she knew that she'd been very willing to be sold . . . but in the meantime, for two years after Joe's father died, she went along into the gay new life the money bought them. There wasn't a thing to worry about. . . . Until that awful day when, having met Helen Fielding for lunch, she decided to join her on a shopping tour. They went to Hilton's first, because Helen was convinced that they did something to the mirrdrs there so that everyone looked beautiful. A few minutes later, Helen was twirling before the dressing-room mirrors in a slender brown suit at whose Paris label they had both looked with awe when the salesgirl brought it out. "Try it in black," Marsha advised. "It's stunning, but brown isn't right for you." Regretfully, the salesgirl said they didn't have it in black. "It's the only one we'll be getting of that model," she said proudly. "The only one in town. But I have some others. ..." She disappeared, and Helen took off the suit with a sigh. . "Just my luck," she grumbled. "Here, you try it, Marsha. I hate to let it get away, it's so wonderfully French. I bet you look terrific in it." Marsha laughed. "Not me. I just came along for the ride." She held the. suit up against her; and regarded herself thoughtfully in the glass. "It does look right, though . . . oh, well. I'll just slip into it. Maybe it won't fit. It's a terrible price." But it did fit. It was breathtaking — so perfect that the salesgirl, when she returned, had the good sense not to say anything. When a customer looked like that in a garment, one didn't have to sell it. Marsha, meeting the girl's knowing eyes in the mirror, grinned. "I'm not strong enough to resist," she said. "I'll take it. It's a charge, please. . . ." It took Helen considerably longer to make a selection, but finally she found something she thought was "special" enough. They gave the salesgirl their names and addresses and were about to leave when the girl, looking worried, reappeared in the doorway. "Mrs. Hubel, would you come this way," she murmured. "It'll take just a moment. ..." Helen wasn't an observant woman, so it didn't occur to her that when Marsha returned her pale lips and startled eyes were the mask of shock. She was only mildly surprised at Marsha's abrupt recollection that she was having company for dinner and had to get home at once. Later, Marsha was desperately grateful that she'd been with so self-centered a person when the shock came, because otherwise her obvious distress must have drawn comment and question. . . . All the way home in the cab she fought her growing panic. It was an accident. Joe could explain and straighten it out. The section manager himself had said it, hadn't he? "An oversight, Mrs. Hubel," he'd said — and why on earth, she thought angrily, had he been so embarrassed? What a fuss he'd made! He'd muttered so she could hardly hear — "so long overdue, the office refuses (Continued on page 95)