A whole month more went by afore Jim Henry Jacobs was well enough to
come home. When he got off the train at the Ostable depot, thin and
white and lookin’ as if he’d been hauled through a knothole, I was
waitin’ for him. Maybe we wa’n’t glad to see each other! We shook hands
for pretty nigh five minutes, I cal’late. I loaded him into my buggy and
drove him down to the Poquit House and took him upstairs to his room,
which had been made as comf’table and cozy as it’s possible to make a
room in that kind of a boardin’-house.
He set down in a big chair and looked around him.
"By George, Skipper!" he says, fetchin’ a long breath, "this is home,
and I’m mighty glad to be here. Where’d all the flowers come from?"
"Mary is responsible for them," I told him. "She thought they’d sort of
brighten up things."
"They do, all right," says he, grateful. "And now tell me about
business. How is everything?"
I told him that everything was fine; trade was tip-top, and so on. He
listened and was pleased, but I could see there was somethin’ else on
his mind.
"There’s just one thing more," he said, soon’s he got the chance. "I
knew the store must be O. K.; your letters told me that. But—er—but—"
tryin’ hard to be casual and not too interested, "how is Frank doin’
with his restaurant? How’s the 'Sign of the Windmill’ gettin’ on?"
Then I told him the whole yarn, almost as I’ve told it here. He
listened, breakin’ out with exclamations and such every little while.
When I got to where the Washburn man told who Frank and the stewardess
was, he couldn’t hold in any longer.
"A crook!" he sung out. "A crook! And she was his wife!"
"So it seems," says I. "And that ain’t all of it, neither. You remember
the doctor said he’d drawn his account out of the Ostable bank. Yes.
Well, that account didn’t amount to much; he’d used it about all,
anyway. But there was another account in his wife’s name at the Sandwich
bank, and _that_ was fairly good size."
"Did you get hold of that?" he asked, excited.
"No, we didn’t. ’Twas in her name and we wouldn’t have touched it, if
we’d wanted to; but we didn’t get the chance. She drew it all the very
next mornin’ and the pair of ’em cleared out. I judge they’d planned to
skip in a few days anyhow, and our creditors’ raid only hurried things
up a little mite. The whole thing was a skin game—Frank and his precious
wife had seen ruination comin’ on and they’d laid plans to feather their
own nest and let the rest of us whistle. We ain’t seen ’em from that day
to this."
He was shakin’ all over. "You ain’t?" he shouted, jumpin’ from the
chair. "You ain’t? Why not? What did you let ’em get away for? Why
didn’t you set the police after ’em? What sort of managin’ do you call
that? I—I—"
"Hush!" says I, surprised to see him act so. "Hush, Jim! you ain’t heard
the whole of it yet. Our bill—"
"Bill be hanged!" he broke in. "I don’t care a continental about the
bill. I invested fifteen hundred dollars of my own money in that
road-house, and you let that fakir get away with the whole of it. You’re
a nice partner!"
_I_ was surprised now, and a good deal cut up and hurt. ’Twas an
understandin’ between us—not a written one, but an understandin’ just
the same—that neither should go into any outside deal without tellin’
the other. We’d agreed to that after the row concernin’ Taylor and the
"Palace Parlors." So I was surprised and hurt and mad. But I held in
well as I could.
"That’s enough of that, Jim Henry!" says I. "I’ll talk about that later.
Now I’ll tell you the rest of the yarn I started with. After that
critter who called himself Frank, but whose name, it seemed, was
Francis, had galloped away with the stewardess woman, there was
consider’ble excitement around that dinin’-room, now I tell you.
However, Johnson and Washburn and me managed to get together in the
private office and I told ’em all about how we come to be there, and
about our gettin’ their dinner, and all the rest of it. They seemed to
think 'twas funny, laughed liked a pair of loons, but I was a long ways
from laughin’.
"’Well, well, well!’ says Johnson, when I’d finished, 'that’s the best
joke I’ve heard in a month of Sundays. You sartinly have your own ways
of doin’ business down here, Cap’n Snow. But the dinner was a good one
and I’ll pay you for it now. How much?’
"’Well,’ says I, ’I suppose I ought to get what I can for our crowd to
leave with their wives and relations afore we’re carted to jail. Course
the meal we got for you wa’n’t what you expected and I can’t charge that
Frank thief’s price for it; but I’ve got to charge somethin’. If you
think a dollar a head wouldn’t be too much, I—’
"’A _dollar_!’ says both of ’em. ’A dollar!’
"’Do you mean that’s all you’ll charge?’ says Johnson. ’A dollar for
_that_ dinner! It was the best—’
"’You bet it was!’ says Washburn.
"’Look here!’ goes on Johnson. ’I was to pay Frank, or whatever his real
name is, two-fifty a plate. Yours was wuth three of any meal I ever got
here, but, if you will be satisfied with the contract price I made with
him, I’ll give you a check now. And, Cap’n Snow, let me give you a piece
of advice. Now you’ve got this hotel, keep it; keep it and run it. If
you can furnish dinners like this one every day in the week durin’ the
summer and fall you’ll have customers enough. Why, I’ll engage
twenty-five plates for next Sunday, myself. I’ve got another week-end
party, haven’t I, Wash?’
"’If you haven’t I can get one for you,’ says Washburn. ’Johnson’s
advice is good, Cap’n. Keep this place and run it yourself. Don’t be
afraid of Francis. Confound him! I ought to have him jailed. The Club
would pitch me out if they knew I had the chance and didn’t take it. But
I won’t, for your sake. So long as he doesn’t trouble you I’ll keep
quiet. But if he _does_ trouble you, if he ever comes back, just send
for me. However, you won’t have to send; he’ll never come back.’
"And," says I, to Jim Henry, "he ain’t ever come back. I talked the
matter over with Mary and Alpheus and a few of the others and, after
consider’ble misgivin’s on my part, we reached an agreement. I decided
to run the ’Sign of the Windmill’ myself. We bounced the chef and his
helpers and the foreign waiters and hired Alpheus’s wife and Cahoon’s
daughter and four or five more. We fed ten folks that next day and they
all said they was comin’ again. They did and they fetched others. The
upshot of it is that all that hotel’s outstandin’ bills have been paid,
the place is out of debt, and the outlook for next season is somethin’
fine. There, Jim Henry, that’s the yarn. I went through Purgatory
because I figgered that you had trusted the store business in my hands
and the Windmill’s bill was so large and I thought I was responsible for
it. If I’d known you’d put money into the shebang without tellin’ me,
your partner, a word about it, maybe I’d have felt worse. I _should_
have felt worse—I do now—but in another way. I didn’t think you’d do
such a thing, Jim! I honestly didn’t."
He’d set down while I was talkin’. Now he got up again.
"Skipper," he says, sort of broken, "I—I don’t know what to say to you.
I—"
"It’s all right," says I, pretty sharp. "Your fifteen hundred’s all
right, I cal’late. The furniture and fixin’s are wuth that, I guess. Is
there anything else you want to ask me? If not I’m goin’ to the store."
I was turnin’ to go, but he stepped for’ard and stopped me.
"Zeb," he says, his face workin’, "don’t go away mad. I’ve been a chump.
You ought to hate me, but I—I hope you won’t. I was a fool. I thought
because you was country that you hadn’t any head for business, and when
you wouldn’t invest in that Windmill proposition I was sore and went
into it myself. My conscience has plagued me ever since. I’m a low-down
chump. I deserve to lose the fifteen hundred and I’m glad I did. By the
Lord Harry! you’ve got more real business instinct than I ever dreamed
of."
He looked so sort of weak and sick and pitiful that I was awful sorry
for him, in spite of everything.
"Don’t talk foolish," says I. "You ain’t lost your money. It’s yours
now; at least I don’t think Brother Fred George Eben Frank Francis’ll
ever turn up to claim it."
He shook his head. "Not much!" he says. "You don’t suppose I’ll take a
share in that hotel, after you and your smart managin’ saved it, do you?
I ain’t quite as mean as that, no matter what you think. No, sir, you’ve
made good and the whole property is yours. All I want you to do is to
give me another chance. If I live I’ll show you how thankful I—"
"There! there!" says I, all upset, "don’t say another word. Of course
we’ll hang together in this, same as in everything else. Shake, and
let’s forget it."
We shook hands and his was so thin and white I felt worse than ever.
"Skipper," he says, "I can’t thank—"
"No need to thank me," I cut in. "If you’ve got to thank anybody, thank
Mary Blaisdell. She’s been the brains of that eatin’-house concern ever
since I took hold of it. She’s a wonder, that woman. If she’d been my
own sister she couldn’t have done more. I wish she was."
He looked at me, pretty queer.
"Skipper," says he, smilin’, "if you wish that you’re a bigger chump
than I’ve been, and that’s sayin’ a heap."
What in the world he meant by that I didn’t know—but I didn’t ask him.
Not that I didn’t think. I’d been thinkin’ a lot of foolish things
lately, but you could have cut my head off afore I said ’em out loud,
even to myself.
He came down to the store the next mornin’ and the sight of it seemed to
be the very tonic he needed. He got better day by day and pretty soon
was his own brisk self again. "The Sign of the Windmill"—by the way, I’d
changed the name on my own hook and ’twas the "Sign of the Bluefish"
now—done fust rate all through the fall and when we closed it we was
sure that next summer it would be a little gold mine for us. In fact,
everything in the trade line looked good, by-products and all, and I
ought to have been a happy man. But I wa’n’t exactly. Somehow or other I
couldn’t feel quite contented. I didn’t know what was the matter with me
and when I hinted as much to Jacobs he just looked at me and laughed.
"You’re lonesome, that’s what’s the matter with you," he says. "You’re
too good a man to be boardin’ at a one-horse ranch like the Poquit."
"I’ll admit that," says I. "I’ll give in that I’m next door to an angel
and ought to wear wings, if it’ll please you any to have me say so. And
the Poquit ain’t a paradise, by no means. But I’ve sailed salt water for
the biggest part of my life and it ain’t poor grub that ails me."
"Who said it was?" says he. "I said you were lonesome. You ought to have
a home."
"Old Mans’ Home you mean, I s’pose. Well, I ain’t goin’ there yet."
He laughed again and walked off.
In October he went up to Boston and came back with his head full of new
ideas and his pockets full of notions. He’d been to what the
advertisements called the Industrial Exhibition in Mechanics’ Buildin’
up there, and had fetched back every last thing he could get for nothin’
and some few that he bought cheap. He had a sample trap that, accordin’
to the circular, would catch all the able-bodied rats in a township the
fust night and make all the crippled and bedridden ones grieve
themselves to death of disappointment because they couldn’t get into it
afore closin’ hours. And he had the Gunners’ Pocket Companion, which was
a foldin’ hatchet and butcher knife, with a corkscrew in the handle; and
samples of "cereal coffee" that didn’t taste like either cereal or
coffee; and safety razors that were warranted not to cut—and wouldn’t;
and—and I don’t know what all. These was side issues, however, as you
might say. What he was really enthusiastic over was the Eureka
Adjustable Aluminum Window Screen. If he’d been a mosquito he couldn’t
have been more anxious about them screens.
"They’re the greatest ever, Skipper!" he says to me, enthusiastic. "Fit
any window; can’t rust—and a child of twelve can put ’em up."
"That part don’t count," says I. "Nowadays if a child of twelve ain’t
halfway through Harvard his folks send for the doctor. I may be a
hayseed, but I read the magazines."
He went right along, never payin’ no attention, and praisin’ up them
screens as if he was nominatin’ 'em for office. Finally he made
proclamation that he’d applied—in the store name, of course—for the
Ostable County agency for ’em.
"But why?" says I. "We’ve got an adjustable screen agency now. And
they’re good screens, too. No mosquito can get through them—unless it
takes to usin’ a can-opener, which wouldn’t surprise me a whole lot."
"I know they are good screens," says he; "but there’s nothin’ new or
novel about ’em. And, I tell you, Cap’n Zeb, it’s novelty that catches
the coin. We want to get the contract for screenin’ that new hotel at
West Ostable. It’ll be ready in a couple of months and there’s two
hundred rooms in it. Let’s say there are two windows to a room; that’s
four hundred screens—besides doors and all the rest. That hotel will
need screens, won’t it?"
"Need ’em!" says I. "In West Ostable! In among all them salt meadows and
cedar swamps! It’ll need screens and nettin’s and insect powder and
'intment—and even then nobody but the hard-of-hearin’ bo’rders’ll be
able to sleep on account of the hummin’. Need screens! _That_ hotel! My
soul and body!"
Well, then, we must get the contract—that’s all. It was well wuth the
trouble of gettin’. And with the Adjustable Aluminum to start with, and
he, Jim Henry, to do the talkin’, we would get it. He’d applied for the
county agency and the Adjustable folks had about decided to give it to
him. They’d write and let us know pretty soon.
A week went by and we didn’t hear a word. Then, on the followin’ Monday
but one, come a letter. Jim Henry was openin’ the mail and I heard him
rip loose a brisk remark.
"What’s the matter?" says I.
"Matter!" he snarls. "Why, the miserable four-flushers have turned me
down—that’s all. Read that!"
I took the letter he handed me. It was type-wrote on a big sheet of
paper, with a printed head, readin’: "Ormstein & Meyer, Hardware and
Tools. Manufacturers of Eureka Adjustable Aluminum Window Screens." And
this is what it said:
_Mr. J. H. Jacobs_,
_Ostable Grocery, Dry Goods, Boots and Shoes and Fancy Goods
Store, Ostable, Mass._
_Dear Sir_: Regarding your application for Ostable County ag’y
Eureka Adjustable Aluminum Window Screens, would say that we
have decided to give ag’y to party named Geo. Lentz, who will
give entire time to it instead making it a side issue as per
your conversation with our Mr. Meyer. Regretting that we cannot
do business together in this regard, but trusting for a
continuance of your valued patronage, we remain
Yours truly,
_Ormstein & Meyer._
Dic. M—L. G.
"Now what do you think of that?" snaps Jim, mad as he could stick. "What
do you think of that!"
"Well," says I, slow, "I think that, speakin’ as a man in the
crosstrees, it looks as if you and me wouldn’t furnish screens for the
West Ostable Hotel."
He half shut his eyes and stared at me hard.
"Oh!" says he. "That’s what you think, hey?"
"Why, yes," I says. "Don’t you?"
"No!" he sings out, so loud that ’Dolph Cahoon, our new clerk, who’d
been half asleep in the lee of the gingham and calico dressgoods
counter, jumped up and stepped on the store cat. The cat beat for port
down the back stairs, whoopin’ comments, and ’Dolph begun measurin’
calico as if he was wound up for eight days.
"No!" says Jacobs again, soon as the cat’s opinion of ’Dolph had faded
away into the cellar—"No!" he says. "I don’t think it at all. We may not
sell Eureka Adjustables to that hotel, but we’ll sell screens to it—and
don’t you forget that. I’ll make it my business to get that contract if
I don’t do anything else. I’m no quitter, if you are!"
"Nary quit!" says I. "I’ll stand by to pull whatever rope I can; but it
does seem to me that this agent, whoever he is, will have an eye on that
hotel. And, accordin’ to your accounts, he’s got better goods than we
have."
"Maybe. But if he’s a better salesman than I am he’ll have to go some to
prove it. I’ll beat him, by fair means or foul, just to get even. That’s
a promise, Skipper, and I call you to witness it."
"Wonder who this Geo. Lentz is," says I. "’Tain’t a Cape name, that’s
sure."
"I don’t care who he is. I only wish he’d have the nerve to come into
this store—that’s all. He’d go out on the fly—I tell you that! And
that’s another promise."
Maybe ’twas; but, if so—However, I’m a little mite ahead of myself; fust
come fust served, as the youngest boy said when the father undertook to
thrash the whole family. The fust thing that happened after our talk and
the Eureka folks’ letter was Jim Henry’s goin’ over to West Ostable to
see Parkinson, the hotel man. He went in the new runabout automobile
that he’d bought since he got back from the West, and was gone pretty
nigh all day. When he got back he was hopeful—I could see that.
"Well," says he, "I’ve laid the cornerstone. I’ve talked the
Nonesuch"—that was the brand of screen we carried—"to beat the cars; and
we’ll have a show to get in a bid, at any rate. It’ll be six weeks more
afore the contract’s given out, and meantime yours truly will be on the
job. If our old college chum, G. Lentz, Esquire, don’t hustle he’ll be
left at the post."
"What sort of a chap is this Parkinson man?" I asked.
"Oh, he’s all right; big and fat and good-natured. A good feller, I
should say. Likes automobilin’, too, and thinks my car is a winner."
"Married, is he?" says I.
"No; he’s a widower. That’s a good thing, too."
"Why? What’s that got to do with it?"
"A whole lot. If he was married I’d have to take Mrs. P. along on our
auto rides; and—let alone the fact that there wouldn’t be room—she’d
want to talk scenery instead of screens. Women and business don’t mix.
That’s one reason why I’ve never married."
I couldn’t help thinkin’ of some of the hints he’d been heavin’ at
me—the "home" remarks and so on—but I never said nothin’.
This was a Tuesday. And when, on Thursday afternoon, I walked into the
store, after havin’ had dinner at the Poquit, I found ’Dolph Cahoon—our
new clerk I’ve mentioned already—leanin’ graceful and easy over the
candy counter and talkin’ with a young woman I’d never seen afore. I
didn’t look at her very close, but I got a sort of general observation
as I walked aft to the post-office department; and, sifted down, that
observation left me with remembrances of a blue serge jacket and skirt,
cut clipper fashion and fittin’ as if they was built for the craft that
was in ’em; a little blue hat—a real hat; not a velvet tar barrel upside
down—with a little white gull’s wing on it; brown eyes and brown hair,
and a white collar and shirtwaist. I didn’t stop to hail, you
understand; but I judged that the stranger’s home port wa’n’t Ostable or
any of the Cape towns. Ostable outfitters don’t rig ’em that way.
I come in the side door, and ’Dolph or his customer didn’t notice me.
The young woman was lookin’ into the showcase; and, as for ’Dolph, he
wouldn’t have noticed the President of the United States just then. He
was twirlin’ his red mustache with the hand that had the rock-crystal
ring on the finger of it, and his talk was a sort of sugared purr—at
least, that’s the nighest description of it that I can get at.
I set down in my chair at the postmaster’s desk and begun to turn over
some papers. Mary had gone to dinner and Jim Henry was away in his auto;
so I was all alone. I turned over the papers, but I couldn’t get my mind
on ’em—the talk outside was too prevailin’, so to speak.
'Dolph was doin’ the heft of it. The young woman’s answers was short and
not too interested. 'Dolph was remarkin’ about the weather and what a
dull winter we’d had, and how glad he’d be when spring really set in and
the summer folks begun to come—and so on.
"Really," says he, and though I couldn’t see him I’d have bet that the
mustache and ring was doin’ business—"Really," he says, "there’s a
dreadful lack of cultivated society in this town, Miss—er—"
He held up here, waitin’, I judged, for the young woman to give her
name. However, she didn’t; so he purred ahead.
"There’s so few folks," he says, "for a young feller like me—used to the
city—to associate with. This is a jay place all right. I’m only here
temporary. I shall go back to Brockton in the fall, I guess."
_I_ guessed he’d go sooner; but I kept still.
"Are you goin’ to remain here for some time?" he asked.
"Possibly," says the girl.
"I’m ’fraid you’ll find it pretty dull, won’t you?"
"Perhaps."
"I should be glad to introduce you to the folks that are worth knowin’.
Are you fond of dancin’? There’s a subscription ball at the town hall
to-night."
This was what a lawyer’d call a leadin’ question, seemed to me; but the
answer didn’t seem to lead to anything warmer than the North Pole. The
young woman said, "Indeed?" and that was all.
"I’m perfectly dippy about waltzin’," says ’Dolph. "By the way, won’t
you have some confectionery? These chocolates are pretty fair."
I riz to my feet. I don’t mind bein’ a philanthropist once in a while,
but I like to do my philanthropin’ fust-hand. And them chocolates sold
for sixty cents a pound!
I had my hand on the doorknob. Just as I turned it I heard the young
woman say, crisp and cold as a fresh cucumber:
"Pardon me, but will your employer be in soon? If not I’ll call
again—when he is in."
"You won’t have to," says I, steppin’ out of the post-office room and
walkin’ over toward the candy counter. "One of him’s in now. ’Dolph, you
can put them chocolates back in the case. Oh, yes—and you might
associate yourself with the broom and waltz out and sweep the front
platform. It’s been needin’ your cultivated society bad."
The rest of that clerk’s face turned as red as his mustache, and the way
he slammed the chocolate box into the showcase was a caution! Then I
turned to the young woman, who was as sober as a deacon, except for her
eyes, which were snappin’ with fun, and says I:
"You wanted to see me, I believe, miss. My name’s Zebulon Snow and I’m
one of the partners in this jay place. What can I do for you?"
She waited until ’Dolph and the broom had moved out to the platform.
Then she turned to me and she says:
"Captain Snow," she says, "I understand that your firm here is intendin’
puttin’ in a bid for the window screens at the new hotel at West
Ostable. Is that so?"
I was consider’ble surprised, but I didn’t see any reason why I
shouldn’t tell the truth.
"Why, yes, ma’am," says I; "we are figgerin’ on the job. Are you
interested in that hotel? If you are I’d be glad to show you samples of
the Nonesuch screen. We cal’late that it’s a mighty slick article."
She smiled, pretty as a picture.
"I am interested in the hotel," she says; "and in screens, though not
exactly in the way you mean, perhaps. Here is my card."
She took a little leather wallet out of her jacket-pocket and handed me
a card. I took it. ’Twas printed neat as could be; but it wa’n’t the
neatness of the printin’ that set me all aback, with my canvas
flappin’—’twas what that printin’ said:
GEORGIANNA LENTZ
_Ostable County Agent for the_
_Eureka Adjustable Aluminum Window Screen_
"What?—What!—Hey?" says I.
"Yes," says she.
"Agent for the Eureka Adjusta—You!"
"Why, yes; of course. The Eureka people wrote you that they had given me
the agency, didn’t they?"
I rubbed my forehead.
"They wrote my partner and me," I stammered, "that they’d given it to—to
a feller named George—er—that is—"
"Not George—Georgianna. Oh, I see! They abbreviated the name and so you
thought—Of course you did. How odd!"
She laughed. I’d have laughed too, maybe, if I’d had sense enough to
think of it; but I hadn’t, just then.
"You the agent!" says I. "A—a woman!"
"Yes."
"But—but a woman!"
"Well?" pretty crisp. "I admit I am a woman; but is that any reason why
I should not sell window screens?"
I rubbed my forehead some more. These are progressive days we’re livin’
in, and sometimes I have to hustle to keep abreast of ’em.
"Why, no," says I, slow; "I cal’late ’tain’t. I suppose there’s no law
against a woman’s sellin’ 'most any article that is salable, window
screens or anything else if she wants to; but I can’t see—"
"Why she should want to? Perhaps not. However, we needn’t go into that
just now. The fact is I do want to and intend to. I have secured a
boardin’ place here in Ostable and shall make the town my headquarters.
This is a small community and one naturally prefers to be friendly with
all the people in it. So, after thinkin’ the matter over, I decided that
it was best to begin with a clear understandin’. Do you follow me?"
"I—I guess so. Heave ahead; I’ll do my best to keep you in sight. If the
weather gets too thick I’ll sound the foghorn. Go on."
"I am naturally desirous of securin’ the hotel screen contract. So, I
understand, are you. I have seen Mr. Parkinson, the hotel man, and he
tells me that your firm and mine will probably be the only bidders. Now
that makes us rivals, but it need not necessarily make us enemies. My
proposition is this: You will submit your bid and I will submit mine.
The party submittin’ the lowest bid—quality of product considered—will
win. I propose that we let it go in that way. We might, of course, do a
great many other things—might attempt to bring influence to bear;
might—well, might cultivate Mr. Parkinson’s acquaintance, and—and so on.
You might do that—so might I, I suppose; but, for my part, I prefer to
make this a fair, honorable business rivalry, in which the best man—er—"
"Or woman," I couldn’t help puttin’ in.
"In which the best bid wins. I have already demonstrated the Eureka for
Mr. Parkinson’s benefit and left a sample with him. He tells me that you
have done the same with the Nonesuch. I will agree—if you will—to let
the matter rest there, submittin’ our respective bids when the time
comes and abidin’ by the result. Now what do you say?"
'Twas pretty hard to say anything. I wanted to laugh; but I couldn’t do
that. If there ever was anybody in dead earnest ’twas this partic’lar
young woman. And she wa’n’t the kind to laugh at either. She might be in
a queer sort of business for a female—but she was nobody’s fool.
"Well," she asks again, "what do you say?"
I shook my head. "I can’t say anything very definite just this minute,"
I told her. "I’ve got a partner, and naturally I can’t do much without
consultin’ him; but I will say this, though," noticin’ that she looked
pretty disappointed—"I’ll say that, fur’s I’m concerned, I’m agreeable."
She smiled and, as I cal’late I’ve said afore, her smile was wuth
lookin’ at.
"Thank you so much, Cap’n Snow," she says. "Then we shall be friends,
sha’n’t we? Except in business, I mean."
"I hope so—sartin," says I. "Now it ain’t none of my affairs, of course,
but I am curious. How did you ever happen to take the agency for—for
window screens?"
That made her serious right off. She might smile at other things, but
not at her trade; that was life and death for sure.
"I took it," she says, "for several reasons. My mother died recently and
I was left alone. My means were not sufficient to support me. I have
done office work, typewritin’, and so on, for some years; but I felt
that the opportunities in the positions I held were limited and I
determined to take up sellin’—that is where the larger returns are.
Don’t you think so?"
"Oh, yes—sartin."
"Yes. I knew Mr. Meyer slightly in a business way. I took the Eureka
screen and sold it on commission about Boston for a time. Then I applied
for the Ostable County agency and got it—that’s all."
"I see," says I. "Yes, yes. Well, I must say that, for a girl, you—"
She interrupted me quick.
"I don’t see that my bein’ a girl has anything to do with it," she says.
"And in this agreement of ours, if it is made, I don’t wish the
difference of sex considered at all. This is a business proposition and
sex has nothin’ to do with it. Is that plain?"
"Yes," says I, considerin’, "it’s plain; but I ain’t sure that—"
"I am sure," she interrupts—"and you must be. I wish to be treated in
this matter exactly as if I were a man. I wish I were one!"
"I doubt if you’d get most men to agree with you in that wish," I says.
"However, never mind. I’ll do my best to get Mr. Jacobs, my partner, to
say ’Yes’ to your proposal. And I hope you’ll do fust-rate, even if we
are what you call rivals. Drop in any time, Miss Georg—Georgianna, I
mean."
We shook hands and she went away. I went as fur as the platform with
her. When I turned to go in again I noticed ’Dolph Cahoon starin’ after
her, with his eyes and mouth open.
"Gosh!" says he, grinnin’. "By gosh! She’s a peach! Ain’t she, Cap’n
Zeb?"
"Maybe so," says I, pretty short; "but I don’t recollect that we hired
you as a judge of fruit. Has that broom took root in the dirt on this
platform? Or what is the matter?"