Princess of the 19th Century Department Store - Chapter 11

Chapter 11

Agnes was not especially beautiful, but her accent was pure West End: low, magnetic, the sort of voice that made people fall quiet and listen. It added a touch of elegance to her bearing.

Mr. Nash was still hesitating when Daisy spoke first.

“This really is an excellent position. Anyone would be willing to take it, and I truly appreciate your willingness to help me.

“However, you have always taught us that whatever we do, we must act with a sense of responsibility. Now that my family needs help, I naturally can’t just stand by and do nothing.

“I also believe I can help them get through this difficult period very soon.”

Her answer was airtight, both flattering and sincere. Even Agnes, who moved in social circles and was used to constant flattery, could find no fault with it.

She looked at Daisy. She had never had much of an impression of this ordinary, obedient girl, but now she was somewhat surprised, and privately wondered how she had failed to notice her before.

“That is fine as well. A little practical experience will help you understand what you want in the future. If you still wish to obtain a position, you may come back to me.”

A faint smile appeared on Agnes’s face. Only now did she begin to observe Daisy’s every movement, and she did not mind doing the girl a favor.

She turned to the secretary beside her, cleared her throat, and said, “Refund her tuition for this month, and inform Mrs. Purny as well.”

The secretary nodded and immediately led the two of them out of the headmistress’s office to the office next door to collect the money.

While waiting in the accounting room, Daisy caught sight of several middle-aged women seated around a desk, working through the accounts.

They were sorting the purchase invoices for the school’s food supplies for the week.

Although more than two hundred girls ate very little at each meal-just two slices of toast per person, a little bacon, and some vegetable soup-the kitchen’s purchasing figures still added up to a considerable amount.

The previous week had used roughly seven hundred pounds of flour, fifty pounds of butter, one thousand eggs, two hundred pounds of bacon, four hundred cabbages, four hundred pounds of carrots, and ten pounds each of salt and sugar.

The invoice listed the individual prices, and all together it came to only thirty or forty pounds.

She had no idea which wholesaler the school purchased from, but the prices were much lower than market rates. In the original host’s memory, the food quality had been fairly decent as well.

Mrs. Purny, who managed the school’s logistics, was holding a stack of invoices and account sheets, signing them and stamping them with her private seal for remittance.

Perhaps heaven itself was helping her. A gust of wind blew in through the gap in the window, scattering the invoices everywhere.

Daisy immediately helped pick them up, pretending to move closer by accident as she glanced over and clearly saw the mailing address on the invoice.

Surrey, Mitcham, Onisg Farm on Shallow Lake Road.

That place was just south of London, an undeveloped cluster of farms administratively under Surrey. The dairy where Mr. Nash worked was also nearby.

She silently memorized every piece of information that might prove useful, then quickly helped tidy everything up.

After a while, once they had collected this month’s tuition refund, Mr. Nash and Daisy left the Girls’ School and returned home by the same route.

By the time they arrived, it was just after eight. The morning commuter rush around Lacla Street had already passed, and the factories in the surrounding area had begun emitting their steady, rhythmic noise again.

As Daisy entered the mouth of the alley, she saw that Lobit Grocery had opened as well.

George, the young errand boy employed by Lobit, was carrying water and scrubbing the floor.

The boy was all skin and bones, dressed in a patched coarse tweed coat. He dragged a heavy wooden bucket around the doorway and knelt to wipe the steps.

Lobit had taken this errand boy out of the workhouse. He had been working in the grocery since he was eleven, and it had already been three years.

In the original host’s memory, the fact that he had survived this long was nothing short of luck.

He had to mind the shop and sell goods, do the cleaning, and even help Mrs. Lobit look after the children. As for wages, those depended entirely on Lobit’s mood.

Daisy did not feel even the slightest ounce of excessive sympathy a merchant did not need. She merely considered how she might make use of this situation.

She followed her grandfather back into their own home.

In the morning shop, the shutters and front door had both been opened, and there were already two customers inside.

Mary had taken in one more baby to look after today. At that moment, she was holding the child, who had not yet adjusted to the unfamiliar surroundings, soothing it while also serving the customers.

Early that morning, after Penny woke up, she had not even eaten breakfast. Craving biscuits terribly, she had taken a stack of two hundred flyers and run out with them.
After stuffing flyers into the residential apartments in the alley, she had gone to the nearby streets as well. She had only just made it home and set foot inside.

No sooner had she handed out those little advertisements than someone came over with a flyer in hand, wanting to buy something.

Mary had listened to Daisy’s instructions yesterday, so she sold the goods according to the prices listed on the flyer.

Most of the discounted items for sale had already been packed and weighed by Daisy the day before. All Mary had to do was take out the whole package and settle the bill.

That went a long way toward keeping Mary from getting flustered.

After Daisy came home, she took off her hat and scarf, then quickly took over Mary’s work and rang up the two customers herself.

The two customers in front of her were both neighbors who ran shops on Clark Street.

One was a widow who owned a secondhand furniture store, dressed all in black.

The other was the proprietress of the little coffee shop next door, wearing a thick apron.

Their shops were not far from Nash Grocery. As soon as they opened their doors, they saw the flyers that had been slipped inside. Since there were not many customers in the morning anyway, they came over to take a look.

Following the promotional prices on the flyer, the two of them bought quite a few daily necessities.

There were packets of cheap tea leaves, salt and sugar, and things like soap.

After the bill was settled, the widow who ran the secondhand furniture shop was in no hurry to leave. She pinched an old white silk scarf in one hand and leaned against the counter with her woven straw bag, asking softly,

“Did you write all the words on this paper? Your handwriting is quite good, and you have a nice way with words too. Could you help me write a few price tags?”

Daisy had not expected to develop a little ghostwriting business on the side, but she did not refuse.

She did not even ask the widow to pay separately. She simply took a few pieces of card stock and slowly began writing out the price tags.

The widow’s shop covered a wide range of business. From secondhand washbasins to secondhand beds, she bought them all, refurbished them, and sold them again.

Her prices were also quite cheap. A worker’s wages for a day or two were enough to buy a small wooden bed, so business was usually rather good.

As Daisy wrote, she asked the widow for advice on which wholesaler sold better paint. She wanted to tidy up the shelves in her own shop.

The widow seemed a little surprised that Daisy was asking her for guidance. In the past, Daisy had never spoken to her.

So the widow recommended a wholesaler that specialized in oils and paints.

“This is my secret to refurbishing furniture, so don’t go telling anyone. Give the owner my name, and he won’t try to fool you with fake goods.”

Before leaving, the widow reminded her with a coquettish little look.

Daisy immediately realized that the paint seller was probably the widow’s lover.

But in the original owner’s memories, this widow had quite a few lovers. The owners of the nearby hardware store and carpenter’s shop were among them too.

Daisy thought to herself that this widow was oddly career-minded. Even the lovers she found could be put to use in refurbishing secondhand furniture.

As soon as the woman left, Penny slipped out from behind the curtain. Seeing that Daisy was free, she asked her for biscuits.

Daisy generously opened a packet and shared it with Penny, tasting one herself as well.

These biscuits were old stock, brought in last week. They had been bought wholesale starting at twenty pounds, at a purchase price of four pence per pound, and half of them were still left.

Although they were stored in tinplate boxes that could be sealed, they no longer tasted very crisp.

Daisy planned to make them the main item of the day and clear them out.

But not selling biscuits at all would not do either. In London now, rich and poor alike were in the habit of eating two meals a day, plus afternoon tea.

For the rich in the West End, afternoon tea meant an elegant three-tiered cake stand. For the East End, a few biscuits with a cup of cheap black tea was the most suitable form of afternoon tea.

Once this batch of biscuit stock was cleared out, she planned to develop a few recipes herself, bake a batch of biscuits by hand, and produce and sell them in-house.

Once ordinary branded retail shops reached a certain scale, part of the packaged food in the store would be supplied under their own private labels.

Their own brand development, their own source factory handling production and delivery-this allowed quality control to be standardized to the greatest degree, while also reducing the inventory pressure on the storefront.

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