CONCERNING TRADE
It was Christmas week, and East Cyrus was making ready for the festival.
The butcher's shop was hung with turkeys and chickens, and bright with
green of celery and red of cranberries and apples. The dry-goods store
displayed in its window, beside the folds of gingham and "wool goods"
and the shirt-waist patterns, a shining array of dolls and sofa-pillows,
pincushions and knitted shoes; while the bookstore had all the holiday
magazines, and a splendid assortment of tissue paper in every possible
shade.
But delightful as all this was to the eyes of East Cyrus, there was one
shop that so far outshone the rest that all day long an admiring group
of children stood before it, gazing in at the window, and fairly
goggling with wonder and longing. This was the shop of Mr. Ivory
Cheeseman. Across and across the window were strings of silver tinsel,
wonderful enough in themselves, but still more wonderful for the freight
they bore; canes of every description, from the massive walking-stick
that might have supported Lonzo's giant frame, down to dapper and
delicate affairs no bigger than one's little finger; and all made of
candy, red and white and yellow. That was a sight in itself, I should
hope; but that was not all. The broad shelf beneath was covered with
tinsel-sprinkled green, and here were creatures many, cats and lions and
elephants, dromedaries and horses and turtles, all in clear barley
sugar, red and yellow and white. Chocolate mice there were, too, bigger
than the cats as a rule; and flanking these zooelogical wonders, row upon
row of shining glass jars, containing every stick that ever was
twisted, every drop that ever was dropped.
Inside, a long counter overflowed with the more recondite forms of
goodies, caramels, and burnt almonds, chocolate creams and the like;
behind this counter a pretty girl stood smiling, ready to dispense
delight in any sugary form, at so much a pound.
In the kitchen behind the shop the little stove was glowing like a
friendly demon, and beside the long table stood Mr. Cheeseman and Calvin
Parks, deep in talk.
"Now you want," said the old man, "to get a _good price_ for these
goods, friend Parks. I'm lettin' you have 'em at wholesale price,
because you're a man I like, and because I wish to see you well fixed
and provided with a partner for life. Now here's your chance, and I'm
goin' to speak right out plain. You're a good fellow, but you are not a
man of business!"
"That's right!" murmured Calvin meekly. "That's straight, stem to
stern."
"I hear about you now and again, in the way of trade," Mr. Cheeseman
went on. "Folks come in, and talk a spell; you know how 'tis. I've gone
so fur as to ask folks about you, folks whose opinion was worth havin'.
They all like you fust-rate; say you're a good feller, none better, but
you'll never make good. Ask 'em why, and they tell about your givin'
goods away right along; a half a dozen sticks here, a roll of lozengers
there, quarter-pounds all along the ro'd so to say. Now, young man, that
ain't trade!"
Calvin's slow blood crept up among the roots of his hair. "I don't know
as it's any of their darned business!" he said slowly.
"It ain't, nor yet it ain't mine to tell you; nor yet it ain't the
wind's; yet it keeps on blowin' just the same, and while you're cussin'
it for liftin' your hat off, it's turnin' your windmill for you. See?"
Calvin raised his head with a jerk.
"I see!" he said. "That's straight. I see that, Mr. Cheeseman, and thank
you for sayin' it. But--well now, see how 'tis at my end. I'm joggin'
along the ro'd, see? hossy and me, who so peart, lookin' for trade.
Well, here come a little gal; pretty, like as not,--little gals mostly
are, and when they ain't you're sorry enough to make it even--and when
she sees us she stops, and hossy stops. He knows! wouldn't go on if I
told him to. Say she don't speak a word; say she just looks at me kind
o' wishful; what would you do? She's a child, and she wants a stick of
candy; that's what I'm there for, ain't it, to see that she gets it?
Well! and she hasn't got a cent. What would you do? Would you drive off
and leave her cryin' in the ro'd behind you?"
"I would!" said Mr. Cheeseman firmly. "She'd ought to have got a cent
from her Ma, and she'll do it next time if you don't give in now."
"Mebbe she has no Ma!" said Calvin gloomily. "Mebbe her Ma's a Tartar."
"That ain't your lookout!" retorted Mr. Cheeseman. "Now, friend Parks,
it comes to just this. You put this to yourself straight; are you
runnin' a candy route, or an orphan asylum?"
Calvin was silent, gazing darkly at the pan of cinnamon drops before
him. Mr. Cheeseman, having driven his nail home, put away his hammer.
"Now about your stock!" he said cheerfully. "You rather run to sticks in
your fancy, but if I was you I'd go a mite more into fancy truck
Christmas time. Gives 'em a change, and seems more holiday like. Take
this lobster loaf, now!"
He laid his hand on a huge mass, chocolate-coated, its side displaying
strata of red and white. "This is a good article when you strike a
large family or a corner store. It's cheap, and it's fillin'. You let me
put you up a couple of loaves; what say?"
"All right!" said Calvin, still gloomily. "What next?"
"Well, here's chicken bones!" and Mr. Cheeseman picked up a handful of
short white sticks. "These is good goods; try one!"
Calvin crunched a stick. "Chocolate fillin'?" he said.
"Yes; with just a dite of peanut butter to give it a twist. Children
like 'em; like the name, too; makes 'em think of the turkey that's
comin'. Two or three pounds of them? That's right! All the sticks, I
s'pose? and all the drops? That's it! I expect you to make your fortune
this time, and no mistake. Now we come to gum drops! how about them?"
"Well," said Calvin, "I never found gum drops what you'd call real
amusin' myself; I like something with a mite more snap to it, don't
you?"
"Did, when I had teeth like yours!" Mr. Cheeseman replied. "But you take
old folks, or folks that's had their teeth out, and say, 'gum drops' to
'em, and they'll run like chickens. They like something soft, you see.
How's your route off for teeth?"
"Why--I don't know as I've noticed specially!" said Calvin, his brown
eyes growing round.
"Fust thing a candy man ought to notice! Well, you take a good stock of
gum drops, that's my advice. Now come to the animals--what is it,
Lonzo?"
Lonzo shambled in from the shop; the tears were running down his platter
face, and his huge frame shook with sobs.
"She--she won't give me the el'phant!" he said.
"What elephant? Cheer up, Lonzo! don't you cry, son; Christmas is
comin', you know."
"You said--you said--if I cleaned the dishes all up good for Christmas I
could take my pick, and I picked the el'phant, and she won't give it to
me!"
At this juncture the pretty girl appeared, flushed and defiant.
"Mr. Cheeseman, he wants that big elephant, the handsomest thing in the
window; and it's a shame, and he sha'n't have it. I offered him the one
you made first, that got its leg broke, and he won't look at it. There's
just as much eatin' to it, for I saved the leg."
"I don't want to eat it!" sobbed Lonzo. "I want to love it a spell
fust."
Mr. Cheeseman looked grave. "Well!" he said, "we'll see, son! You stop
cryin', anyhow."
He went into the shop, Calvin following him, and they looked over the
low green curtain into the show-window. In the very centre, towering
above the lions, camels and rabbits, stood a majestic white elephant
fully a foot high. His tusks were of clear barley sugar; he carried a
gilded howdah in which sat an affable personage with chocolate
countenance and peppermint turban; the whole was a triumph of art, and
Mr. Cheeseman gazed on it with pride, and Calvin with admiration.
"It's the handsomest piece of confectionery I ever saw!" said Calvin
with conviction.
"It _is_ handsome, I'm free to confess!" said Mr. Cheeseman. "It cost me
consid'able labor, that did. Take it out careful, Cynthy!"
"Mr. Cheeseman! you ain't goin' to give it to Lonzo!" cried the pretty
girl indignantly.
"Certin I am!" said the old man. "I told him he should take his pick,
and he's taken it. I didn't think of that figger, 'tis true, but what I
say I stand to. Easy there! I guess you'd better let me lift it out,
Cynthy!"
Very tenderly he lifted out the glittering trophy and placed it in
Lonzo's outstretched hands. The simpleton chuckled his rapture, and
retired to his dim corner--to worship, one might have thought; he put
his prize on a low table and grovelled before it on the floor.
Mr. Cheeseman, heedless of Cynthy's lamentations, proceeded to
re-arrange the show-window, trying one effect and another, head on one
side and eyes screwed critically. Satisfied at length, he turned slowly
and rather reluctantly toward Calvin Parks, who had been standing
silently by.
"After all," he said apologetically, "Christmas is for the children, and
Lonzo is the Lord's child, my wife used to say, and I expect she was
right."
Calvin's twinkle burst into a smile.
"That's all right, Mr. Cheeseman!" he said. "That suits me first-rate. I
was only wonderin' whether it was just exactly what you would call
trade!"