I guess you know Zadok Biggs, the little tin-peddler who was always
whistling. If you don’t you ought to know him, because he knows more
than almost anybody else in the world, I guess. That’s because he has
traveled around a lot on his red wagon, and talked to almost everybody
in Michigan. Besides, I think he had quite a lot of brains to start
with. He says so, anyhow, and he told us that the only reason he wasn’t
a judge in the United States Supreme Court was because he was so little.
You see, he started out with the idea of being a big man, and he is
pretty good-sized when he sits down, but as soon as he stands up he’s
only about four feet. That is a handicap for a judge. Still, Mark Tidd
says it is more important what a judge has in his head than in the legs
of his pants, and maybe he’s right.
Zadok came into town next day and drove right up to Tidds’. He thinks
Mark is the greatest boy in the world, on account of his name. Zadok is
funny about names. He collects them like some boys do stamps or birds’
eggs, and he says Mark’s name, Marcus Aurelius Fortunatus Tidd, is the
best one of the lot.
“Well, well, well!” he said. “What’s this I am informed? (Most folks
would say ‘told.’) Runnin’ a mill, eh? Now can you beat that? Indeed you
cannot. But what would one expect of a boy with a name like Marcus
Aurelius Fortunatus Tidd? Nothing less. A boy with such a name is bound
to be remarkable. What success, Marcus, what success?”
“We’re goin’ p-p-pretty good,” says Mark.
“To be sure. Certainly. You are, as I understand, fabricating
(‘manufacturing’ is the usual word) articles from wood.”
“Yes.”
“Wooden chopping-bowls, perhaps.”
“Yes.”
“A good product. A fine thing to make. The market is good now. I am
obliged to pay much more for them than I did. I hope your prices have
gone up.”
“They have,” says Mark.
“And are you having any trouble? You always have trouble, do you not?
You always meet with opposition—unjust opposition?”
Then Mark told him all about it, and Zadok was as mad as a sparrow that
a cat chases away from a pile of crumbs.
“My name, Zadok,” he said, “means ‘just.’ It describes me. I am just by
name and just by nature. Such things as this fill me with wrath. (Most
men would say ‘make me mad.’) What are you doing to this man Wiggamore?”
“The question is what is he doing to us,” says I.
“No, no,” says Zadok. “Ask Marcus Aurelius if it is. When a man plans to
do you harm you do not wait until he does it. No, indeed. Instead, you
plan yourself how to avert the calamity. Is that not so, Marcus? And you
lay schemes to get the better of that man?”
“That’s right,” says Mark.
“Zadok will help you. Not that Marcus Tidd needs help, but the brain and
the experience of Zadok Biggs are at your disposal. Zadok will look
about and Zadok will set his vast intelligence to work. Then an
opportunity may present itself. Opportunities are marvelous things, and
you are quick to grasp them. A hint, and you see your chance. Be
patient, be watchful, and Zadok will give the hint.”
With that he went into the house to see Mr. Tidd and Mark’s mother and
we went to work.
That afternoon a man came up into the mill and we saw him go over and
talk to Silas Doolittle. After a while both of them came over to us, and
Silas said the man was a Mr. Dwight that was in the woodenware business
in the city and an old customer of his.
“I sold him most of my bowls, and he handled a good sight of drumsticks
and dumb-bells and tenpins for me. Seems like I never had very good luck
sellin’ such things, and Mr. Dwight he used to come over every little
while, jest like he’s done to-day, and kind of take things off my
hands.”
“Yes,” says Dwight. “I’m always glad to help a friend out. Silas tells
me you have quite a little stock in the warehouse. Well, I don’t need
anything just now, and prices are ’way down and the market is loaded up,
but just to be a good fellow I’ll take what you’ve got.”
Silas was beaming and happy. He looked like he thought he had done a
fine stroke of business.
“Ship ’em to the same address?” says he.
“Yes,” says Dwight.
“I’ll go and git in a car,” says Silas.
Mark looked at him out of the corner of his eye, but he didn’t grin or
speak sharp or do anything unpleasant. He wouldn’t have hurt Silas’s
feelings for a lot. It wasn’t Silas’s fault he hadn’t any head for
business, and he was doing his best. But Mark just says, sort of
hesitating-like:
“Jest a m-m-minute, Silas. What p-price was Mr. Dwight offerin’?”
“Why,” says Silas, “we didn’t say nothin’ about price! I know Dwight’ll
send us a check for whatever he’s warranted in payin’.”
“I know he would,” says Mark, “but s-s-somehow I’d rather know jest what
he’s goin’ to p-pay before we ship. What f-figger do you calc’late you
kin give, Mr. Dwight?”
“Why, it’s like this,” says Dwight. “Retail prices is ’way down, and
everybody’s loaded up with stock. I can’t offer as much as I’d like to.
You better just send them along, and I’ll give you the best price I can
when I dispose of the goods.”
“Somehow that d-d-don’t sound jest right to me,” says Mark. “It’s kind
of uncertain. I think we ought to know jest what you’ll p-p-pay.”
“Well,” says Dwight, “I couldn’t offer you as much to-day as I might be
able to get for you. I’ve got to be safe. I couldn’t set a price and
then sell at a loss. You’d get more by waiting.”
“Maybe so,” says Mark, “but I’d rather you m-made an offer.”
Dwight sort of hesitated a little and hemmed and hawed, but pretty soon
he told Mark what he could pay for each kind of goods.
“Um!...” says Mark. “That the b-best you can do?”
“It’s the best the market will allow me to offer.”
“Market’s crowded, eh?”
“Badly.”
“With bowls in special?” says Mark.
“Yes,” says Dwight.
“Um!... Good mornin’, Mr. Dwight. I don’t calc’late we kin do any
b-b-business.”
“Why not? What’s wrong with that offer?”
“It hain’t fair,” says Mark.
“What——”
“And _you_ hain’t fair,” says Mark, “and I calc’late, jedgin’ from what
you’ve tried to do to-day, that you hain’t n-never been fair with Mr.
Bugg.”
“What do you mean, young man? Are you charging me with sharp practice?”
“I’m sayin’,” says Mark, in the gentle way he has when somebody’s done
something to make him think they’re cheating him—“I’m sayin’ that you’ve
known Silas perty well, and you’ve made perty good m-money off him.
You’ve come over here a g-g-good many times, makin’ b’lieve you was
doin’ a favor, when you was actually payin’ him a lot less than he could
git for his goods if he had known what he was d-doin’.”
“Now, Mark—” says Silas, in that frightened way of his.
“Young man—” began Dwight again. But Mark interrupted.
“I’ve took the t-t-trouble to study the market, Mr. Dwight. I know that
bowls is s-s-scarce and in demand. I know what p-prices is b-bein’ paid,
and you’re offerin’ about half of ’em, makin’ b’lieve you’re doin’ a
favor. You come figgerin’ you could t-take advantage of Silas, and that
wasn’t a very large-sized kind of a thing for a man to do, was it? You
took advantage. There’s folks would say it wasn’t h-honest.”
“Look here, now——”
“So,” says Mark, “I guess we don’t want to t-t-trade with you—not in any
circumstances.”
“Why not, I’d like to know?”
“Because,” says Mark, still speaking courteous and gentle-like, “it
don’t n-n-never pay to do business with a man you don’t t-trust.”
“Now, Mark——” says Silas again.
Mark didn’t pay any attention. “Here’s what the market p-prices of bowls
is,” says he, and he told Dwight just what every size was bringing.
“That’s a f-f-fair price, too. I know what our cost is, and that
g-g-gives us jest a decent profit. But I wouldn’t sell to you, Mr.
Dwight, if you was to offer twice that. I jest don’t want to have any
dealin’s with you at all. Good mornin’.”
He turned away and went into the office, and Dwight and Silas and the
rest of us stood looking after him with our mouths open. Silas he
stepped from one foot to the other and fussed with his nose and looked
like he wished he could crawl in some place and hide. Dwight looked mad
and embarrassed and red in the face, like anybody does when he gets
caught at something.
“What’s that kid got to do with your mill?” says he to Silas.
“He’s the boss,” Silas says.
“Do you believe the nonsense he’s been telling you?”
“Wa-al,” says Silas, looking more scairt than ever, “I’ll tell you how
it is. I’ve never knowed that boy to say somethin’ that wasn’t so. He
don’t never make no statements he hain’t prepared to back up, and he
knows more about business than I ever calc’late to know.... Yes, I
figger what he says was so.”
“And you’re going to stand for his keeping that stock in the warehouse
when you could get rid of it at a fair price?”
“I can’t help myself,” says Silas. “He’s boss. But, Dwight, if he wasn’t
boss, and he said what he said this mornin’, I guess I wouldn’t sell.
’Cause why? ’Cause he knows what he’s talkin’ about whenever he opens
his mouth.... I got to git out into the log-yard, Dwight. I’m kind of
sorry this here happened, because I always figgered you was a kind of a
friend of mine. It hain’t pleasant to know somebody you trusted has been
cheatin’ you reg’lar.”
Well, Dwight he turned around and went away from there pretty sudden,
and he looked like he’d et something that disagreed with him. A man must
feel pretty small and mean when somebody catches him trying to play a
low-down trick.
Zadok came into the office about the middle of the afternoon, and he was
grinning like all-git-out. “Ha, Marcus Aurelius!” says he. “Opportunity
spelled with a capital O. Opportunity is everywhere. Always one is under
your nose. You have but to see and pluck it. (‘Pick’ is the commoner
word.) I shall not tell you about the Opportunity I have seen, but I
shall hint at it. A hint should be enough for you.”
“F-fine!” says Mark. “Go right ahead and hint. If there’s anything I
love it’s g-g-guessin’ riddles.”
“Here’s one hint,” says Zadok. “Listen carefully: A dam is not valuable
to a power company without a power-station.”
Mark nodded. “You got to t-t-turn your water-power into electricity, of
course,” says he.
Zadok looked at us proudly. “There,” says he, “did I not tell you?
Marcus Aurelius Fortunatus Tidd! In a second. He grasps the idea in a
second.”
“I grasped that one myself,” says Binney.
“Yes,” says Zadok, “but, now you’ve grasped it, what do you contemplate
doing with it? Eh? Tell me that?”
“Why,” says Binney, “I don’t know!”
“Do you, Mark?” said Tallow.
“Not yet,” says Mark, “but I’m g-g-goin’ to study it. I’ll find out.”
“To be sure. Certainly. That’s the thing. He’s going to find out, and
you may be sure he will find out. Now for hint number two: If you’ve got
to have a thing you can’t get along without it. There. How’s that for a
hint? Can’t think of a better one, can you? I don’t believe you can. And
the best part of it is that those hints are first cousins. They are
blood relations.... That’s all the hints. If you discover their meaning,
then you have this man Wiggamore at your mercy. But it will not be easy.
It will require work and brains. Marcus Tidd has the brains and you all
can work. Now about bowls. And drumsticks. And turned stock. You have a
supply in the warehouse, I am told.”
“Quite a lot,” says Tallow, whose job it is to keep tally of stock.
“And you wish to sell them?”
“To be sure.”
“In that case, communicate with the address on this card. It is a good
firm, a reliable firm, an honest firm.... Now I must be going. Good-by
all.”
We said good-by and then looked out of the window to see him start off
with his red wagon that rattled and clanged and banged with all the
tinware inside it and hooked on the outside of it. We watched till he
turned the corner and was out of sight.
“Now,” says I, “what d’you calc’late he was talkin’ about?”
“Haven’t any idee,” says Binney.
“Power-houses,” says Tallow, “and havin’ to have things, because if you
haven’t got ’em you are that much short, and if you got to have ’em and
you hain’t got ’em, why, you hain’t got somethin’ that you can’t git
along without. That’s about it, hain’t it?”
“You don’t say it so’s it’s very clear,” says I.
“Maybe you kin do better,” says he.
“I hain’t sayin’ so,” says I. “But there’s somethin’ important mixed up
in it.”
“Yes,” says Mark. “Zadok always knows what he’s t-t-talkin’ about.”
“Pervidin’ he’s talkin’ about anything at all,” says I.
“But he was,” says Mark, “and I’m goin’ to f-f-find out all I kin about
p-power-stations, and see how they match up with havin’ to have what you
can’t git along w-w-without.”
“And you better see about sellin’ them bowls and things,” says Tallow.
“Perty soon we’ll have the warehouse cram full, and then what?”
“Then we’ll have to eat ’em,” says Mark.
“I seen Wiggamore come in town this mornin’,” says Tallow.
“Um!... Wonder what he’s up to. Bet it’s s-s-somethin’ nasty. Tell you
what, Tallow, you and Binney skin out and keep an eye on him. He
d-d-don’t know you like he’d know me. Stay around as clost to him as
possible, and see how much you kin h-hear of what he’s sayin’. And
remember it. Don’t forgit anythin’. You never kin tell when a word will
be mighty important. If he talks to anybody, r-remember who it is. Git
to hear as much as you kin, and don’t lose sight of him a minnit.”