"MEET me in the ice cream parlor," Sam had whispered as Bert had passed out of the store. Time, moving forward with its exact and inexorable measure, may sometimes seem to race; but as the boy sat in the sweet shop with his eyes fastened impatiently on a wall clock, the minutes seemed to limp and to drag as though they had sore feet. At a quarter past nine Sam came in.
"We'll have to meet here every night," he said. "Your father buys my time and I can't do my own work when I'm paid to do his. What are you going to have?"
"Lemon soda," said Bert.
"That's fifteen cents. Fifteen cents a night is ninety cents a week . . . we can walk around and talk on Sundays. Haven't they any five-cent drinks? Fifteen cents is too much. A man who throws away his money soon throws away his business."
It developed that he could buy an unpalatable, chemical orange phosphate fof ten cents. With the unwholesome drink before him he leaned across the table.
"Let's get this thing started," he said. "First, we must find a store that we can afford to rent. Second, we must get tables, and chairs, and some pictures for the walls, and paper table cloths and napkins. I know a place in the city where you can buy second-hand furniture. If they have a catalogue we can select from that. Then we want a small ice-box for ice cream. We've got to have plates, and cups and saucers, and knives, forks and spoons. It's going to be a job getting all this stuff together."
Bert was appalled.
"There you go," Sam said impatiently, "getting cold feet. Running a business isn't a picnic. Look what Woolworth went through before his five-and-ten-cent stores were a success. We've simply got to buckle down and get things done. I'll write to these furniture people to-night. You scout around and see if you can find a vacant store. It's got to be on Washington Avenue. I heard to-day that the italian who runs the bootblack and hat cleaning place is going to get out. It is a small store, but it would be big enough for us. Look that up to-morrow."
"Suppose we can't find a store?" Bert asked anxiously.
Sam's voice had the earnest tone of a prophet who has seei a vision. "Never admit defeat. To think of failure is to fail."
Bert felt that the clerk was quoting from the book. It sounded good, but he didn't see how it solved the problem of finding a place in which to establish and rear a young and promising industry.
As he opened the door of his home, a murmur of voices ceased in the dining room. He knew, instinctively, that his father and mother had been talking about him. When he entered the dining room his father was reading a newspaper—a stern man who did not invite conversation. Bert lingered a while, uncomfortable and constrained, and went off to bed. After a few minutes his mother followed him upstairs.
"Bert, are you sure this thing you have planned to do is a wise move?"
"Pop's been talking to you," he challenged.
"Well, it does seem a little improbable."
"Pop always claimed that Sam had a good business head. Didn't he? If he had a good head yesterday he ought to have a good head to-day."
"But this is different. Walking straight in the path that somebody else has cleared is one thing; clearing your own, solving all your own troubles, is another. What your father really meant was that Sam showed great promise."
"Funny he never said it that way, though, until now."
Mrs. Quinby sighed. "There's no use arguing with you, Bert. You always did give more heed to what somebody outside told you." She was silent a moment. "Be careful," she said, and started downstairs.
"Mom!" He called her back. "Is pop very mad?"
"Yes," she said, and was gone.
"Wait until he sees me getting my twenty-five dollars every week," Bert reflected optimistically, and dropped into slumber.
In the morning, thoroughly alive to the responsibility and importance of his errand, he set out to find an acceptable store. He had an idea that he would ask the bootblack if he were really to quit business, but it was not necessary to ask. A sign, freshly pasted on the window, announced to all and sundry that the place was to let, and carried the invitation to "see F. L. Plecktoff, real estate and insurance."
A girl in the real estate office told Bert that Mr. Plecktoff had gone to the city and would not be back until four o'clock. At the appointed hour he returned to the office.
"Mr. Plecktoff just telephoned," the girl told him. "He has been detained. He won't be here until seven o'clock."
At seven o'clock Bert was back again. This time Mr. Plecktoff was there, a thin little wisp of man, bald and bilious, with a habit of leaning back in his chair and drumming—his fingers on his legs. If he was surprised at a boy asking the rental of a store he did not show it . . . many strange things come under the observation of a real estate agent.
"Twenty-five dollars a month," he said. "The present tenant will move out in about five days. You can have what amounts to immediate possession. I'll accept a deposit now."
Bert had less than one dollar in his pocket. It seemed to him, even in his inexperience, that to admit to such a fact would make this visit ludicrous.
"I'll have to talk to my partner," he said.
"The store may be taken when you get back," Mr. Plecktoff said, and saw that the shot went home. "A man was in to see me about the place early this morning. I'm expecting him back any moment. You had better take it quickly if you want it."
Bert grew cold with the thought of losing this opportunity and for a moment played with the wild idea of offering the dollar for an option until nine o'clock. But the smallness of the sum held him back.
"I'll have to see my partner," he repeated.
"You won't find another small store along Washington Avenue," Mr. Plecktoff prodded, pressing his advantage. "If I had only five dollars," Bert thought, and left abruptly lest he be tempted, if he stayed, to reveal the meagerness of his immediate resources.
No candy store meeting to-night; time was too precious. He waited near his father's place. Would that other man reach Mr. Plecktoff's before he and Sam had a chance to get there? What would they do if the store was taken? Would they be able to find another place in which to establish themselves? Twice he walked back to the real estate office, and sighed with relief to find nobody there. At nine o'clock he was still keeping his vigil for Sam, and when the clerk appeared he caught his arm.
"Hurry," he said. "I've found our store, but somebody else is hot after it and we may be too late."
Sam quickened his pace. "I saw Plecktoff's sign in the window at noon. Went around to see him, but he wasn't there. Who told you somebody else was after it?"
"Mr. Plecktoff."
"Oh!" Sam's stride lessened. "I told his clerk I was interested; I'm the other man. That's an old game with real estate men, trying to rush you into biting on what they have. Did he tell you the rent?"
"Twenty-five dollars a month."
"Huh! Well, we'll see. Maybe we can do better than that. Pay as little as you can and sell for all you can get. That's business."
They came to the real estate office, and Sam led the way inside. Mr. Plecktoff gave Bert an unemotional glance. He seemed to pick Sam as the leader of the expedition, and gave that young man his attention.
"My partner has been telling me about the store," Sam began boldly. "It isn't exactly what we want, but we might be able to use it. If we take the place, when does the rent start?"
"The day the store becomes vacant." Mr. Plecktoff was watching him narrowly.
"But we won't be able to start business for three weeks. We'll pay rent from the first of next month."
The real estate agent's fingers tapped his knees faster. "Impossible! I can't have one of my properties bringing in no revenue. I must pay taxes and I must make a living."
"And we can't pay rent for a store until it brings us a revenue. We haven't the capital," Sam said bluntly. "Do we pay from the first of next month?"
"I cannot do it."
"Then we can't do business. We'll look around for something else. If we can find a better bargain we'll take that. If not, we'll come back here just before we're ready to open."
"A man was in to-day inquiring about that store. If you wait you'll lose it."
"Oh, no, I won't," said Sam. "I was the one who was asking about it. I wasn't sure whether my partner would be in to see you."
Mr. Plecktoff's expression showed that some of the wind had been knocked from his sails. And yet he still had one trump card.
"You won't find another store on Washington Avenue," he said with thin triumph.
"We may decide to take a couple of rooms above a store," Sam said carelessly.
Mr. Plecktoff's fingers began to beat a furious rhythm, showing that he was agitated. It might be that these queer visitors might rent rooms. And then what? He had known of stores on the avenue to remain idle a year at a stretch. Better a loss of three weeks than a loss of twelve months.
"My friend," he said with forced cordiality, "on second thought I agree to your proposition. We must make concessions to those who, just starting, have their way before them. We will make a contract for one year, at twenty-five dollars a month. . . ."
"Twenty-five?" Sam broke in, and swung around to Bert. "You told me twenty." Then, without waiting for a reply, he was back again facing Mr. Plecktoff. "We can't afford any twenty-five dollars."
Bert, for a moment bewildered, suddenly began to see light. Sam, by devious wiles and pretensions, was trying to beat down the price. The game was new to Bert, and not at all to his liking. To his boyishly clean nature it smacked a bit of fraud. Sam, in appealing to him, had made him a party to it. Yet he lacked the courage to object, afraid that objection might sum him up as a weak and pitiful being lacking in daring.
He listened, fascinated for all his squeamishness, to the boldness of Sam's attack; and presently a tinge of admiration for the clerk's shrewdness grew upon him. For it was apparent that Sam was holding his own with this real estate man who was probably a veteran of hundreds of such conflicts. Mr. Plecktoff scoffed and cajoled, sneered and argued, grew cold and became wheedling, but all to no purpose. Suddenly Sam shifted the battle ground.
"How about a coat of paint?" he demanded.
Mr. Plecktoff bristled. "What about it?"
"It has to be freshened with a coat of paint. Who's going to pay for that?"
"The tenant."
"Not this tenant. We're renting something we can use, not something we've got to doctor. Here; I'll meet you halfway. You paint the store and we'll pay you twenty-two dollars and a half a month."
"Twenty-four," said Mr. Plecktoff.
"Twenty-three," said Sam. "I can't stand here all night. Take it or leave it." He turned toward the door.
"No wonder," Mr. Plecktoff said feelingly, "that landlords die in poorhouses. Twenty-three dollars, then, and a deposit now. If you want the place give me no promises, but put something down. Money talks."
"Put it in writing," said Sam.
The paper was prepared and signed. The partners of The Shoppers' Service came out into a Washington Avenue that was dark and deserted, for most of the stores were closed.
"Well," Sam said with satisfaction, "that saves us some money. I was sure we'd pay twenty-five dollars, and I expected we'd have to paint the place ourselves. You got to play a sharp hand to get anything out of those fellows."
Bert had an idea that "sharpness" was not the right word, but he did not argue the point.
"How did I do it?" the clerk asked; "good?" Abruptly struck by another thought he changed the conversation without waiting for an answer. "Don't forget that the company owes me the five dollars I paid as a deposit."
The morrow brought, not the catalogue Sam had written for, but several mimeographed sheets describing goods and prices. Sitting in the ice cream parlor, they checked the list, and their faces fell.
"Is it going to cost that much?" Bert asked faintly.
As usual, it was Sam who saw the way out. "We won't order six tables," he said; "we'll get four. Then we'll need only eight chairs instead of twelve. If we find business good we can easily order more. It's time we put up our money. I'll meet you during my lunch hour to-morrow and we'll go to the bank."
So next day Bert withdrew his funds, and then he and Sam filled out a new account card and pushed it through a grilled window to a cashier who viewed them curiously.
"Shoppers' Service," he read, and looked at them again. "What is it?"
"A business," Sam said shortly.
The cashier frowned. "You realize that no money can be withdrawn unless you both sign?"
"That's how I want it," said Sam.
The cashier proceeded to enter their account. When they came out of the bank Bert asked:
"Who's going to mind the bank book?"
"You take it," said Sam. "I won't have to worry. You can't draw anything without my signature. That's business."
It might be business, but the more Bert thought about the remark the queerer it seemed.
Every day there was something to buy, and everything cost more than they had expected to pay. The bootblack moved out, the painters came in, stayed a while and went their way, and then crates, and packages and bundles began to arrive. Bert scrubbed the floor boards, found two small rugs in the attic, begged them from his mother, and brought them to the store. Sam picked up a small counter in the town, and bought a second-hand gas stove that he saw advertised in the local newspaper. When the tables and chairs were set out on the rugs the place began to assume dimensions and proportions.
A curtain was stretched across the store three-quarters way back, and behind this they placed the stove, and the ice box, and the dishes. The curtain was an extra expense . . . they had not expected to buy one. But even Bert could see that the proprieties demanded that the operation of cookirig be hidden from the front of the store.
"When do we begin to get our members?" he asked, "at fifty cents each?" The money was going, out so fast that he had begun to worry. He wanted to see some cash begin to come in.
The question brought to light the fact that there was still more money to spend.
"We've got to let the public know we're in business and what our business is," Sam said. "We've got to have a sign man put our name on the window, and we've got to see that a letter gets to every house in the good part of town. Then, when we go out asking for subscribers, we won't have to explain the whole business at every door."
Sam wrote the copy for the letter and delivered it to a local printer. After grave discussion they decided that mailing the letters would be too expensive.
"We'll put each letter in an envelope that will command attention," Sam said, "and shove them under doorways or drop them in letter boxes."
"Maybe they won't read them," Bert observed dubiously. "Put something on the envelope that will catch their eyes," said Sam. He took a piece of paper from his pocket, thought a moment, and wrote:
If you are a shopper save money through The Shoppers' Service
"All women are shoppers," he stated, "and they all want to save money. This will get them."
The printing was delivered, and for six hours Bert opened gates and climbed porch steps with The Shoppers' Service first appeal. That day he discovered that there were more miles of highway in Springham than he had ever dreamed existed. Footsore and weary he came back to the store to find Bill Harrison and Dolf Muller waiting on the sidewalk.
"You're not starting a business, are you?" Bill demanded.
Bert, completely absorbed in his new occupation, had dropped away from his friends. "Who told you?" he wanted to know.
"Tom Woods. I was out there yesterday."
Bert did not answer at once. It was apparent that to these two, at least, he had stepped out of the ordinary groove of accepted fact and conduct, that he was a person apart, and he gloried in his moment of conquest. Dolf misinterpreted his silence.
"I knew it was a lie," he said triumphantly.
"It's true," Bert said; "we open the store Saturday week."
Dolf's face fell. Bert took a key from his pocket, turned it in the lock, and let them into the store. Bill, after a quick survey, stood leaning against the counter, grave and silent. Dolf went about poking into corners.
"What are you going to sell?" he asked at last.
Bert told them of Sam's idea, showed them the printed letters, and enlarged upon his hopes. Bill read a letter gravely, folded it, and put it back in its envelope. Dolf was frankly scornful.
"It's a punk idea," he sniffed. "The only thing to sell is something people have to have—clothes, and bread and cake, and meat and groceries. We buy one paper every day. Why should we pay fifty cents a month to look at other papers? Why, often my father has time only to look at the funny page. If we had three papers they'd be scattered all over the house and my mother'd be throwing them out."
"We don't deliver the papers," Bert said; "we keep them here."
"That's worse," Dolf said positively. "Catch my mother getting all dressed up just to come out and look at a newspaper."
"Dolf," Bill drawled, "you really ought to come out next year and try for the athletic team."
"Eh?" Dolf started, and squirmed his fat neck out of the tight clutch of his collar. "Why?"
"Because you could beat everybody at the coldwater throw. You must have practiced it a lot."
Dolf sniffed, sulked, and soon departed. It was the usual order of his going whenever the barb of criticism touched him.
Bert turned to the friend who remained. "What do you think of it, Bill?"
"I don't know. Dolf is right in a way . . . you're not selling something that people must have. You're selling what I think is called service. People can't get along without telephones any more—telephone service is too convenient. Maybe, if people find what you have is a big help, they'll never want to be without that, either."
"That's what Sam says," Bert cried, and felt his spirits soar. "How are you coming on with your drawing?"
Bill's eyes glowed. "Tom Woods sent some of my things to an artist in Philadelphia and asked him what he thought of them. The artist says they're promising: that I'm not a bad draughtsman and that I've got a sense of color values. Oh, I'll be doing the pictures for Tom Woods' books some day."
"That's great," said Bert, and meant it. "How do your folks feel about it?"
"All right now. At first my father didn't think much of it, but he's changed around. I think he went out and had a talk with Tom Woods. I'm not sure, but I think so."
After Bill had gone, Bert stood in thought beside the counter. Well, he wasn't getting any encouragement at home. Between him and his father there was a sort of formal neutrality. From his mother he had learned that a new clerk had been engaged. The clerk's name was Matthew Kirby and, putting two and two together, the boy had arrived at the conclusion that no surprising gifts were expected of the newcomer. Matthew Kirby had been accepted, in a sort of resignation, as the best that the moment offered. Bert was sorry for that; his own short experience had given him a taste of some of business's sharp dif—iculties. But he was sorrier still that, at the supper table, prudence closed his lips upon matters that lay close to his heart. It would have meant so much if he could have talked over his problems as he had once discussed the rocks and reefs of his school books.
"Oh, well," he said, rousing himself, "I won't be the first fellow who has had to fight his own way out." The thought, at least, gave him a sense of independence. "To-morrow Sam finishes with my father and then we'll make things hum."
That night the partners decided not to begin the canvas for members until Monday.
"If they join The Shoppers' Service too soon," Sam said thoughtfully, "they'll have a chance to forget it before we open. We can cover all our territory in four days. We've got to get our name on the window, but that can be done any time next week."
So there would be nothing to hold Bert to the store to-morrow. Suddenly he found himself glad of the respite. The work of preparing for the opening had fallen largely on his shoulders. . . . Sam could not get away during the day . . . and he was tired. He did not ask himself what he would do with this unexpected holiday. He knew. Something deep within him urged him to ride out in the country and see the Butterfly Man.
He planned an early start, but the plan miscarried. As he mounted his bicycle at the curb in front of his house and pushed away, the bellowing voice of Peg Scudder halted his progress.
"Hey! Blast you, there, you Quinby, where's your ears?"
Bert halted. "What do you want?"
"I got a letter for you from the other fellow. And don't give me any snippy talk. I'm a hard man when I get going, and I might take a notion to larrup you."
Bert had come to learn that Peg's talk was largely bluster. "Give me the letter," he said, and broke the seal and read:
Bert: I got wind this morning that Mr. Scudder does window lettering. The regulat sign painter wants twelve dollars, but Mr. Scudder will do it for five dollars. It may not be a perfect job, but it will save us seven dollars. Let him do the job at once, and then it's out of the way.
Bert viewed, with equal disfavor, both the letter and its bearer. His desire to ride out into the country became doubly keen now that his plan had been set aside. Yet seven dollars. . . . He remembered having heard his father say that a business man was a slave to his business. There was some truth to it. He crumpled the letter impatiently.
"When can you start?" he asked.
Peg shifted his crutch. "Where's the place? That little hole in the wall on the avenue?"
"That's our store."
"Blast me, but you're getting stuck-up, ain't you? I've seen kids like you before. I'll be there in fifteen minutes."
Peg was as good as his word. He came stumping down the avenue to the minute, a can of paint swinging at his side, brushes in his hip pocket, his wide open shirt showing his suspenders, and his tawny beard rioting in fierce disorder. He wasted little time chalking in the letters, and then set to work with the brushes. At ten o'clock he halted.
"Hey, you!" he called.
Bert came to the door.
"I want two dollars now."
"What do you want it for?"
"Blast me, but you're a nosey kid! What difference does it make what I want it for? Do I have to tell you my private affairs? Maybe I want it to buy a ticket to London and maybe I don't. Just pony up two dollars and ask no questions, and don't forget there'll be three dollars more coming to me when I finish."
Bert was not sure about the ethics of paying for a job before it was finished, but he paid rather than argue. Peg laid his brush across the can and hobbled down the street. Twenty minutes later he was back, a suspicious odor on his breath and a cigar stuck in the corner of his mouth. Whatever had transpired while he was away had evidently put him in a bad humor, for he growled and grumbled as he plied his brush.
The hands of Bert's watch crawled past eleven o'clock. It was apparent that Peg was nearing the end of his labors. Bert walked out into the street, studied the lettering and made a grimace. Well, it saved seven dollars, anyway.
"What's the matter with you?" Peg demanded truculently. "Don't you like it?"
"It will do. What time will you finish?"
"About noon. So it will do! What did you expect for five dollars, an oil painting? Maybe you'd like it in gold leaf. Give a kid a few dollars and he thinks he's quality and sasses his betters. Blast me, in my day a youngster knew his place and kept it."
Bert went into the store. If he could be off by noon he could be at the Butterfly Man's at two o'clock and the day would be saved. When the job was finished he gave Peg the remaining three dollars, demanded a receipt, stuck it in his pocket and locked the store door. Ten minutes later he had left Springham behind.
He found Tom Woods at his bench mounting specimens for a high school museum in another part of the state. There was a constraint about the meeting, and Bert grew ill at ease. In the past he had been content in this room to sit back relaxed, his body at ease, his soul tranquil under the atmosphere of peace and understanding. To-day he stirred restlessly. The Butterfly Man finished, stood two boards of mounted insects against the wall, and absently filled his pipe.
"Bill Harrison was out yesterday," he said.
Bert, in a flash of vision, saw what lay behind the sentence. Bill had told of his visit to the store. A nameless urge had sent him on this visit, but the store was the one topic he wished to avoid. He tried to steer the subject into safer channels.
"Bill was telling me about that letter from the artist!"
The man's voice brightened. "Good ol' Bill. I was scared stiff after it came; afraid I had made a mistake in showing it to him. But I wanted to give him something to hang a hope on. I was afraid he'd get puffed up. 'I suppose you think you're an artist,' I said, watching to see how he'd take it. 'Yes,' he said, 'just the way a drop of water thinks it's a river.' Oh, there's something solid about Bill. Nobody's going to stampede him."
Bert nodded, and sat there silent. That strange restlessness was on him again. The man fell to whistling a tune, and broke it off abruptly.
"Bill tells me, Bert, that you're in this thing."
"Yes, sir. The store opens a week from to-day."
"What does your father think of it?"
"He's sore."
"I thought he would be," said the Butterfly Maan, and silence came again.
Never had a visit to this place of enchantment gone so dismally. Bert said, after a time, that he thought he had better make a break for home. The Butterfly Man roused himself.
"I think I'll run in to Springham and see how much the town has grown. I'll get the car and drive you in. We can put your bicycle in the rear."
Bert gave a feeble grin. The plot was transparent. He was not surprised when, as they ran into the town, the man said:
"Suppose you give me a look at your store. It may be an age before I come to Springham again, and I'd like to get a look at it while I'm here."
So Bert unlocked the door and turned on the lights. Dolf Muller had pried and poked into every corner; Tom. Woods merely sat on the counter and let his eyes rove. His face was inscrutable.
"Rather cozy," he said, and made no other comment. Bert was disappointed and nettled. With clouded face he saw Tom Woods swing down from the counter. He followed him out to the car. The man started the engine and let it idle.
"Bert."
"Yes, sir."
"Will you make me a promise?"
The boy stared at him.
"If anything queer turns up in your business will you promise me to go to your father?"
"Yes, sir."
The man held out his hand. "Shake on it. Good luck."
Those last two words took the sting out of the whole day.
Monday the great adventure started. Instead of struggling alone, Bert found a co-worker at his elbow: and the companionship was warm and stimulating. He had thought that, early in the morning, they would begin the siege of the town in search of members for the Service. But Sam had not read his book of business success for nothing.
"The first thing," he said, "is to lay out a strong, sure-fire selling talk. We can't go out and babble; we must say something. When we ring the bell and a woman opens the door, we must interest her before she can close it. Once her interest is caught the rest should be easy. 'Madam,' we say, 'I am here to save you money.' Money is a magic word. She'll listen, and then we'll tell her how it's done."
All morning they rehearsed imaginary front-door interviews. At noon Bert was sure that he would neither stammer nor falter. He hastened home, ate a hurried meal, and was off to storm the citadel.
The first doorbell he rang brought no immediate response. He rang again. The door opened.
"Madam—" he began.
A child, not a woman, stood within the hall. He was not prepared to be greeted by little girls and his set talk was utterly routed from his mind.
"Mother," the child piped, "says she has all the soaps, and mops, and peeling knives she needs." The door closed.
Bert went down the steps with flushed cheeks. He had been taken for a peddlar—he who had come with a soaring idea of selling a useful service. His pride suffered a fall from which it did not recover all the afternoon.
By five o'clock he found that women were beginning to prepare the evening meal and had no time to waste on salesmen. He came back to the office discouraged and disillusioned. Sam was there, writing names into a book.
"What luck?" he asked.
"Only three."
"I got twelve. I didn't figure you were going to get many the first day. You've got to learn salesmanship. To-morrow you'll do better."
Bert's heart warmed toward his partner. But Sam was not showing a rare magnanimity. The business book had warned him not to expect too much from-new men and not to discourage a beginner with sharp criticism. He had read that in the chapter headed "How the Executive Can Get the Most Out of His Force."
Sam's prediction proved true. On the morrow Bert did better but his total for the day was only five. It was nothing to boast about. By Friday night the entire town had been canvassed, and seventy-eight customers were on the books. That meant a membership fee of $39 a month.
It wasn't much. Even Sam admitted that. But the clerk insisted stoutly that it was a start.
"We can't expect a paying business over night," he said. "The public doesn't really know us yet. We must make our service so good that one woman will tell another. And don't forget we're going to sell food at those tables, and we're going to sell it to-morrow."
Bert was encouraged. "I'll be down early in the morning."
"We'll both be down early," said Sam. "Some of these women may be going down on early trains and we want to be here when they stop to see the advertisements."
But it was ten o'clock next day before the first woman came in to see what the Shoppers' Service had to offer, and Bert had a sneaking idea that she came in out of curiosity.
At noon, when he came home to eat, his mother studied his face.
"How did it go, Bert?"
"Not so good. Sam says we can't expect much at the start."
"Your father's opening day was a disappointment." It was the first word of encouragement that he had received at home, and he looked at his mother gratefully.
A sprinkle of patrons came in during the afternoon, and he copied Sam's manner of cordiality and confidence. Once there were four women in the place at once, and his heart began to flutter with the hope that the rush had started at last. But this sudden burst of trade was only a flurry, and half an hour later the tables were vacant again. He wanted to count the money in the drawer behind the counter, but that would have seemed like a sign of weakness. He restrained his impatience.
"What's that Mr. Clud doing around here?" Sam asked suddenly.
Bert, taking a soiled cloth from a table, swung around. "Where? I haven't seen him."
"He just walked away. That's the third time he's been looking in our window. What's the matter with him?"
Bert did not know. Bill Harrison had told him that Mr. Clud had been snooping around the doorway. He was mystified.
"He can't have much business to attend to," Sam said irritably, "if he's got to come around trying to mind ours. The next time he does it I'll ask him what he wants."
But Old Man Clud did not appear at the window again.
The day grew dark and they turned on the lights.
"Going home for supper?" Sam asked.
"Sure." Bert looked at him in surprise. "Why?"
"There's some of this stuff we won't sell to-day. It may not keep over Sunday. We might as well eat it ourself."
Not wishing to be at a table should a customer enter, they ate in the rear, setting their plates on the three-burner gas stove. Bert washed the dishes, put them away and came down to the door. Washington Avenue was filled with Saturday night shoppers. Back and forth they went along the sidewalk, each one a potential spender of cash. Now and then somebody came in, but the waits in between grew dismal. At eight o'clock the tide of trade was at its height. By nine o'clock it had dwindled perceptibly. Half an hour later some of the stores began to turn out rear lights.
"Might as well call it a day," said Sam.
They counted the receipts—ten dollars and five cents—and entered the amount in a ledger. Probably not more than three dollars of it was profit. And against that meager sum stood rent, light, telephone, the cost of the newspapers and magazines that they would have to buy. Bert felt a stab of discouragement that sickened him. It was Sam who locked the door.
"We've got to find a way to get more interest into this," he said. It was his first confession of failure. "I'll think about it over Sunday. If every business that didn't make a ten-strike right at the start gave up there wouldn't be any business at all."
Bert walked toward home alone. Before he had gone half a block he was conscious of short, quick footsteps in his rear, the wheeze of an asthmatic breathing and a panting call of his name.
"Mr. Quinby! Just a moment, if you please, Mr. Quinby."
It was Old Man Clud, sweating profusely, his coat buttoned tight to his fat, colorless throat though the night was hot. Bert waited.
"So you have gone in business, my young friend. Following in your worthy father's footsteps. You are a fine, bright lad; I always said so. I can see success weaving a web around you. Oh, I have been watching; I am a busy man but I have eyes. From early morning until late at night I have seen you at your labors and I have said to myself. 'There is a young man who will go far.' Believe me, I have your interest at heart, and if you ever need a friend do not hesitate to come to me. There is such a thing, in business, as needing a friend."
He pressed something into Bert's hand and was gone, wheezing and panting and sweating his unhealthy sweat.
Bert looked at his hand and found a card there. He read it:
P. M. Clud
Confidential Loans