“Dad,” said Catty, after Jim Bockers had been in business a week or so,
and had got about all the business there was going just by waiting till
Catty and his father made a price for the job and then doing the work
cheaper than they would, “I got a idea for fixin’ Bockers.”
Mr. Atkins had been showing a little more interest in his business since
Bockers started. It wasn’t that he wanted to work any more, but it sort
of made him mad to have another man prevent him from working, like
Bockers was trying to do. He had been in town a month now, and it seemed
to me like I could see some change in him already. It wasn’t just that
Catty made him keep shaved and his beard trimmed, but it was sort of in
the way he talked and how he looked at things. Most of the time he was
just the same Mr. Atkins that wanted to tramp the roads and be
shiftless, but there were times when he got interested in something, and
for as much as a half an hour at a time didn’t appear to object even to
working. Catty said it was encouraging.
“What’s the idee?” says Mr. Atkins.
“Our sign says builder, don’t it?”
“Calc’late it does.”
“Know anythin’ about buildin’, Dad?”
“Not a doggone thing.”
“Don’t make no difference. Somebody knows about it, and we kin make
arrangements to make use of what _they_ know.”
“Uh-huh. S’pose so.”
“Well, I hear Mr. Witherspoon is goin’ to build him a house. Thing for
us to do is to git the job. Git it sudden ’fore folks know we’re after
it. It ’ll keep us busy, and keep our men busy so’s nobody kin hire ’em
off of us. We’ll make more money, maybe, than just by paintin’ and
paperhangin’, and if we git the job, we’ll have the paintin’ and
paperhangin’ to do, anyhow.”
“How ’ll that bother Bockers?” says Mr. Atkins.
“Why, we kin bid on every job that comes along, and accordin’ to his
agreement he’s got to bid lower ’n what we do. We’ll figure what a job
will cost, and then we’ll be able to bid quite a lot lower ’n it ’ll
cost to do it. Bockers ’ll have to bid lower ’n that, so that every time
he takes a job we’ll be compellin’ him to lose a heap of money. Don’t
figger he’ll be able to keep it up very long.”
“Sounds reasonable,” says Mr. Atkins. “But I dunno nothin’ about
buildin’.”
“Don’t tell anybody,” says Catty, with a grin. “Let’s hike and see Mr.
Witherspoon.” The three of us went over to Mr. Witherspoon’s office and
was shown in.
“We hear you’re figgerin’ on buildin’ a house,” says Catty.
“Yes,” says Mr. Witherspoon.
“Bein’ in the contractin’ business, father and me come over to see about
takin’ the contract to build it—complete, includin’ paintin’ and
paperhangin’ and all.”
“I was thinking of letting separate contracts for each part of the
work.”
Mr. Atkins cleared his throat and up and spoke. I was so surprised I
didn’t know what to do. He was actually helpin’ Catty to land a job!
“My experience,” says he, and he sounded like he had had lots of it, “is
that it hain’t ever satisfactory to let separate contracts. Makes for
delay and scamped work. Your masons has to wait on the cellar-digger,
and the carpenters has to wait on the masons, and the lathers and
plasterers has to wait on the carpenters, and they git to bickerin’ and
quarrelin’, and fust you know somebody’s scamped the work some place....
It’s always best, Mr. Witherspoon, to have one man a-supervisin’ of the
whole job and responsible for everything. Then you kin look to him.”
Mr. Witherspoon nodded. “That sounds very reasonable, Mr. Atkins....
Here are my plans and specifications. I think I shall give you a chance
to bid on the job. Want to take them to figure over?”
“Yes,” says Catty.
He took the papers and we said good-by to Mr. Witherspoon, and out we
went.
“How in tunket,” says Catty, “do you figger out how much it’s goin’ to
cost to build a house?”
“Hain’t got no idee,” says I.
“Nor me,” says Mr. Atkins.
“The name of the feller that drew these plans is printed on ’em,” says
Catty. “Seems like he ought to know.”
“Where’s he at?” says Mr. Atkins. “Canton,” says Catty. “Five miles
east, hain’t it, Wee-wee?”
“Yes,” says I.
“I’ll walk over with ’em,” says Mr. Atkins, eager-like. You see, he was
jest achin’ to get his feet on a sandy road and ramble.
“Fine,” says Catty, and he winked at me. “You and us fellers ’ll walk
over, and maybe ketch the train back. Start in the mornin’.”
So in the morning we started over to Canton to see this man Phillips,
the architect. I was wondering what kind of a man he was and how he
would act, but that didn’t seem to bother Catty much. When we got there
we found him in a little room up-stairs over the express-office, and he
looked like he was just fresh from college. He was nice-lookin’ and I
liked him right off.
“Good morning, gentlemen,” says he. “What can I do for you?”
“Be you the archytect?” says Mr. Atkins.
“I am,” says Mr. Phillips.
“When you make plans for a house kin you figger how much it’s goin’ to
cost to build it?”
“I can.”
“I got some plans you drawed, and I want to git the costs, for diggin’,
masonry, carpenter-work, and all—each sep’rate.... I’m a contractor, Mr.
Phillips, and I calc’late to have quite some work for a handy archytect.
Figger I’ll need a man with idees and brains.”
I was so surprised I almost bit myself. I’d never heard Mr. Atkins talk
like that. He sounded almost like a business man.
Well, sir, we sat down and talked, and pretty soon it seemed like we was
well acquainted, and we began telling each other about ourselves. Seemed
that Mr. Phillips was new at his job and just out of college and hadn’t
any money, and didn’t get much to do. He was interested a lot in Catty
and Mr. Atkins.
“Pity you settled in Canton,” says Mr. Atkins. “Our town’s bigger and
liver and got more business. I look to see it grow.”
“Mr. Phillips,” says Catty, all of a sudden, “why don’t you move over
there? Nothin’ to hold you here. If you’ll come we kin work together. We
got a room you kin use, rent free, as an office, or we can make a kind
of partnership out of it. I figgered on makin’ an ice-cream parlor out
of that room, but I guess there’s more money in architects. Then you’d
be handy to us, and we’d be handy to you.... I tell you, Mr. Phillips,
we kin git the work to do if we kin find somebody to tell us how to do
it.”
“I’m hanged,” says Mr. Phillips, “if I don’t believe you can.”
And that’s how it came about that Jack Phillips moved to our town and
went into business with the Atkinses. It seemed like he was some folks,
too. Had family and all that, but his father had lost his money. Our
town was kind of excited about him comin’, and it was an awful shock to
’em when they seen our sign go up. I say our sign because I was so
interested in the business. The new sign was plain and Catty said it was
dignified. It said:
ATKINS & PHILLIPS
Architects, Contractors, Consulting Engineers
Interior Decorators
The first day after Jack joined in with Catty and his father I heard Mr.
Gage stop him on the street.
“Mr. Phillips, hain’t it?” says Mr. Gage.
“I’m sure you’re right,” says Jack, with the kind of a grin he usually
wears.
“Took up with them Atkinses, have you?” says Mr. Gage.
“The Atkinses have taken me into partnership, if that’s what you mean,”
says Jack, still smiling.
“They’ll do you,” says Mr. Gage. “Nothin’ but tramps off’n the road.
Maybe wuss, for all I know. Folks don’t want ’em in town, and if you git
mixed up with ’em, folks won’t want you.”
“Has Mr. Atkins or his son done anything dishonest to anybody in this
town?”
“Not as I know of.”
“Have they acted in any way other than as decent folks?”
“Wa-al, course they been puttin’ on a good face. Waitin’ their chance,”
says Mr. Gage.
Jack wasn’t smiling any more. “Your name’s Gage, isn’t it? Well, let me
tell you something. Mr. Atkins and Catty have given me a chance when
nobody else had any use for me. Maybe I’m going to be a help to them. I
hope so. I knew all about them before I came. I’m going to stay. I’m Mr.
Atkins’s partner and I’m going to remain Mr. Atkins’s partner.... Maybe
he’s a bit shiftless. But he’s a man of his word, Mr. Gage, and that’s a
lot. He may have been a tramp, but he doesn’t sneak around trying to
injure people who never did him any harm. Mr. Atkins is as good as I am,
Mr. Gage, and I have a notion that both of us are a sight better than a
heap of you backbiters in this town. Am I clear? We’re in business here,
and we’ll _stay_ in business here. Good afternoon.”
With that Jack just turned around and walked off, leaving Mr. Gage
googling after him like he had bumped his head and was seeing stars.
“Bully for you, Jack!” says I.
“D’you know what Catty said to me this morning?” Jack asked me, and he
was grinning again like he was tickled to death.
“No,” says I.
“He asked if I’d ever taken lessons in manners.”
“Huh!” says I.
“He said I acted like I had manners, and he wanted to know where I got
’em. I told him I guess they grew on me like my nose, and he wanted to
know if I wouldn’t sort of take charge of his father and him in the
manners line. I’m going to live with them, of course. He says he’s gone
as far as he’s able teaching his father table manners, and he wants I
should go on from where he left off—teaching both of them.”
“Better do it,” says I, “if Catty wants you to.”
“Guess I will,” says Jack.
“Get that house contract?” says I.
“Landed it this morning. Our price was fifty-four hundred dollars.”
“Much profit into it?”
“We ought to make six or seven hundred.”
“Bully!” says I. “And Catty done it, didn’t he? He was the one that
thought it up.”
“Catty’s the best man of the three of us,” says Jack.
Just then Mr. Arthur Peabody Kinderhook drove past in a buggy, all
dressed up like he was going to a party. He always looked like he was
going to a party, that man did. And he didn’t do any work that I could
notice. Just lived in the hotel and drove around and made believe he was
looking at the town. It kind of leaked out that he was planning on
building a big factory and was choosing the best place to put it. He
didn’t say much. Nobody knew what he was going to manufacture, and when
they asked him he edged away kind of skittish. It got folks all het up
over it. Our town was growing as curious as if he was a circus they
couldn’t get into and there was a lot of death-defying trapeze
performers doing tricks inside all the time.
“Arthur Peabody Kinderhook,” says I, and I told Jack all about him.
We walked back to the store. Catty was reading a letter, and when we
came in he looked up with a kind of scowl.
“Letter from the lumber company. They won’t trust us. Say they’ll ship
that lumber for Witherspoon’s house, C. O. D., whatever that means.”
“It means we’ll have to pay for it before we can get it,” said Jack.
“But we’ve got to use it before we can get the money to pay for it,”
says Catty.
We was all pretty gloomy. It looked right there as if the partnership of
Atkins & Phillips was busted, and I guess Phillips thought so for sure.
But Catty turned to his Dad.
“Hain’t the banks run so’s they kin lend money to folks?” he says.
“Not that I know about personal,” says Mr. Atkins. “None of ’em ever
offered to lend to me.”
“This here is an honest business,” says Catty, “and we kin pay for that
lumber as soon as we git it built into the house. Seems like we deserve
to have folks trust us on a deal like this. Maybe it’s because the
lumber company don’t know about it. Captain Winton, at the bank, will
know all about it. I’m going to see him.”
“No use,” says Jack.
“All right. I’m goin’ just the same. Come on, Wee-wee.”
I started out with him, leaving Jack and Mr. Atkins behind. Jack was
gloomy, but Mr. Atkins was kind of cheerful, because it was one of his
days when he wanted to wander, and I guess he figured if this contract
didn’t go through, why, he could go back to being shiftless again. Catty
and me we walked up the street and turned into the bank. He rapped on
Captain Winton’s door and the captain called to come in. We went.
“Well?” says the captain, looking at us kind of impatient.
“We come to borrow some money, if you want to lend it to us.”
“How much?” says the captain, and he put his hand in his pocket like he
was going after a dime.
“Right off we need eleven hundred dollars,” says Catty.
“What?” says Captain Winton, like he couldn’t believe his ears.
“Eleven hundred dollars,” says Catty, and then before the captain could
get up and throw us out he went on and told why he wanted it, and what
he was going to do with it, and how he could pay it back.
“Why didn’t your father come?” the captain said.
“He didn’t think you’ld lend it.”
“Um!... Contract with Witherspoon, eh? Got it signed and all?”
“Yes.”
“Where is it?”
“I fetched it for you to see.”
“Um!...” The captain looked it over. “Willing to put up this contract as
security?” he says.
“’Course,” says Catty.
“I’m going to lend it to you, and I’ll tell you why,” says the captain.
“In the first place, it is good business for me and the bank. A bank
makes its money by lending to folks at interest. The more it lends where
it knows it will be paid back the more it makes. Then, a bank has to
help a community to grow and develop. Nothing like a good bank to make a
town. We furnish the capital, and men build houses with it, and start
stores and factories. Then they come and deposit the money _they_ make
in the bank. Then the bank has more to lend to somebody else, and it
makes more money. Kind of an endless chain. Really, our business is
helping other folks to build up their businesses. See?”
“Yes,” says Catty.
“I’ve had my eye on you and your father. I know about this young
Phillips that’s gone in with you. It was a good move. I know what the
women of this town are trying to do to you, and how you’ve acted. _I_
think you are honest. You are going at things right. Somehow, tramps or
no tramps, I’ve got confidence in you folks. Is it true,” he says, “that
you are teaching your father manners so he’ll be equipped to meet folks
when he’s a successful business man?”
“Yes,” says Catty.
“Learning them yourself, too?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good!” says the captain. “It’s the kind of thing banks take into
consideration. Didn’t know that, did you?... Um!... It shows you mean to
succeed. The will to succeed is a fine asset, my boy, and I’m proving it
to you. Because it is one of the reasons I’m loaning you this money. Get
your father and Phillips to come and sign a note and the money will be
here for them.... Good luck to you.”
“Thank you, sir,” says Catty.
“Thank _you_,” says the captain, just like he was talking to another
business man.
We hustled back, you can bet.
“Git over to the bank quick and sign a note ’fore he changes his mind,”
says Catty, calm as a puddle of rain-water. “The money’s there waitin’
fur you.”
“You’re joking,” says Jack.
“You’ll find the money hain’t no joke,” says Catty. “You and Dad—git!”
Mr. Atkins shook his head sadlike. “’Tain’t no use,” says he. “I’m fated
to be a business man. There hain’t no hope, nohow.”
“Not a mite,” says Catty. “And, Jack, think up all the manners you kin
to teach us. Captain Winton says they’re an asset, whatever an asset is.
Anyhow, it’s somethin’ that helps you borrow money.”
“Catty,” says Jack, “I’ll cram the pair of you so full of manners that
you’ll look like a busy day in a crowded dancing-school.”
“Guess we kin manage to use all you got to spare,” says Catty, as sober
as a judge.