For Love or Gold? The Story of a Great Department Store

This is issue No. 19 of the Allegiance Library, a series of religious stories published by Street & Smith. The featured work is "For Gold or Soul? The Story of a Great Department Store" by Lurana W. Sheldon (1900). The narrative follows Faith Marvin, a seventeen-year-old girl seeking work at the Denton, Day & Co. department store. When superintendent Mr. Duncan Forbes hints she might displace another employee, Miss Jennings, Faith refuses the position on moral grounds. Forbes, superstitious and with a gravely ill son, is struck by her declaration that "God will punish you." He offers her a packer position at three dollars weekly instead. Shortly after, five hundred dollars disappears from his desk; Forbes accuses Faith of theft, though a detective reveals her father's bookstore was destroyed when the store opened its book department, leading to his suicide. The narrative opens onto scenes of the store's basement—poorly lit, badly ventilated, crowded with two hundred exhausted female employees—depicting their harsh working conditions and coarse speech.