The House of Seven Mabels

and group tours, but to get into the part where real decorators could purchase items at discount rates, you had to have a letterhead document and a business tax number issued by the IRS. If you were approved, you received a clip-on identification tag you had to wear to get in. Those items were all included in the packet of paperwork Bitsy had given them.
    As they inched up, Jane whispered, “What if they say we’re fakes?“
    “They’ll probably just escort us to the front door. Trust me. I’ll take care of it.“
    “Isn’t this just as dishonest as writing term papers for other people?“ Jane asked.
    “Apples versus oranges, Jane. By now, if we’d had a good contract, we’d really be decorators.“
    There was something in this reasoning that wasn’t right, Jane decided, but this was not the time to debate it.
    When they reached the head of the line, Shelley casually surrendered the paperwork as if she’d done it a hundred times before and was bored senseless with the process. She turned to Jane and said, “I think we should hit the kitchen appliances first, and if there’s time today, we can move to bathrooms. Next week we’ll take on the wallpaper.“
    She spoke so confidently and bossily that the guard let them through, barely glancing at their paperwork.
    For several hours they roamed around, getting lost at frequent intervals. Jane seldom bought new dishwashers and fancy plumbing for bathrooms, but Shelley seemed to have the retail prices of everything on earth in her head.
    She kept hissing at Jane, “That’s forty percent off retail. Boy, did I get ripped off when I replaced our bathtub.“ And, “Can you believe this price? It’s less than half what you’d pay in a hardware or department store for this kind of toilet even if you could find one.“
    Contrary to the conversation at the approval stage, Shelley decided they’d look at bathroom things first. She closely examined bidets, rejecting most of them as not having attractive enough hardware. Then she moved on to a wide assortment of medicine cabinets, fancy clothes hampers, disposable Water Piks, gold-plated faucets, bath rugs, monogrammed towels in fifty colors, and an amazingly complete array of countertop ornaments, both practical and stupid. Soap holders shaped like swans, cars, treasure chests, cut-glass candy dishes, and tiny keyboards. Toothbrush holders galore, even silver-plated dental floss holders.
    She looked at about forty different towel rails and decided they must have the heated kind.
    “Imagine, Jane, getting out of the tub and wrapping up in a nice hot towel. You could even throw your robe over one of the heated ones before you bathe.“
    The only thing that really attracted Jane’s attention was a shower with a computer pad that set the temperature of the water so it automatically came on right from the start.
    Shelley pooh-poohed it. “Too many people are afraid of anything computerized,“ she said as she moved along to a couple of dozen lavatory paper holders, toilet brush concealers, and what Jane estimated were nearly a hundred showerheads.
    Jane was soon a victim of overload and sore feet. She shouldn’t have brought such a big heavy purse. She kept bumping into things and other people with it. The big purse seemed to be mysteriously gaining weight as they trudged around. But Shelley was in her element and was energized.
    “I have to go home. I’m hungry. My feet hurt. I’m tired,“ Jane whined at 2:15.
    “What a wimp you are. This is the greatest place I’ve ever seen. I’d camp out in one of those enormous sleigh beds we saw on our way up here for a week if they’d let me,“ Shelley said with a grin.
    “Not me. I can find my way home and get a taxi from the train stop if you want to stay longer.“
    “Okay. We’ll leave. But we’ll come back if Bitsy comes up with a good contract. This surely has been an education. Paul told me about a place nearby that does a fabulous lunch. Come to think of it, I’m hungry, too,“ she said with surprise.
    “Apparently neither your digestive tract nor your feet have told you what you’re doing to them,“ Jane said, turning the wrong way to leave.
    Shelley grabbed Jane’s elbow. “Not that direction. Follow me.“
    Jane took her word for it. While Jane had been all over the world and seldom lost her bearings, the Merchandise Mart had completely destroyed her sense of direction. She obediently trailed along behind Shelley like an exhausted, whimpering