Alex grins.

"That's fine!" he says. "I'm glad you got some spirit left; they's hope for you yet! Let's see," he goes on, like they had been no interruption at all, "how long have you known Miss Evans?"

"Over a year," says Jared. "But I don't see what--"

Alex points a finger at him.

"You love her, don't you?" he barks out.

"Of course I do!" mumbles Jared, like he's answering without knowin' it.

"Then why don't you marry her?"

Jared stares at him like he's in a trance.

"_Marry_ her?" he gasps. "Marry her? Why if I ever asked her _that_, she wouldn't even let me call on her any more!"

"You're crazy!" remarks Alex pleasantly. "Now listen, son! You been goin' around with that girl over a year, and if she didn't reciprocate your feelin' for her, you wouldn't of lasted that long. Jared, old boy, a year is too long to monopolize a girl without declarin'

yourself! You're spoilin' her chances, and it's dead wrong! They is plenty of other young men which would give their left eye to take her to the movies and the like, but they're layin' off because, havin'

always seen her with you, they take it for granted they is no chance.

That's fine right now for both of you; but if anything should arise that would make you two part, it won't be as easy for her to replace you. Now you need a incentive, and a strong one, to put you across.

They is no bigger incentive on earth than matrimony. Go to her and ask--"

"One minute!" b.u.t.ts in Jared. "I never was talked to like this in my life before, and why I'm permitting you to discuss my personal affairs, I don't know. As long as I am, I'll go through with it. What you say may be true, but this girl is different, and--"

"Jared," says Alex, "I don't doubt that she's different, but, nevertheless, she's a member of the well-known female s.e.x, and I'm basin' my dope on that! I'll tell you what I'll do with you. You ask Miss Evans to marry you, and, if she refuses, I'll give you a job myself for fifty dollars a week; fifteen more than you get now. If she accepts, you gotta raise yourself by your own efforts to fifty dollars a week within six months, or go to work for me for twenty. Now if you got some red blood in you, let's see it!"

Well, Jared gets up and walks around the room for a minute and fin'ly he comes over and holds out his hand to Alex.

"You're on!" he says. "Only, I'll say this: If Mabel--er--Miss Evans, accepts me, I'll be so happy that I won't be good for _any_thing for a month. If she refuses me, I'll _never_ be any good any more! However, I'll try it. Perhaps I've been asleep. I don't know. But if this girl ever marries me--" He stops and bangs his fists on the table.

"Oh, boy!!!!" he winds up.

Just then they is a ring at the telephone. The maid makes a entrance and claims Mr. Jared Rushton is wanted. In about five minutes, Jared comes back and apologizes.

"My boss, Mr. Hamilton," he says. "I've always got to let him know where he can get in touch with me after office hours. I gave him your phone number before I came here to-night." He turns to Alex. "That's what it is to be a valuable man," he says. "The boss wants me to get all the data together for an estimate on one of the biggest contracts we've ever had a whack at. That means I'll be up all night, so I'll have to leave now. Our four big contract experts are scattered 'round the country and the boss will have to go after this one himself to-morrow. There will be a conference at the Hotel Dubois, and--"

Alex jumps up, his eyes flashin'.

"Why can't _you_ go after that contract?" he shoots out.

Jared looks like he's been hit on the chin.

"_Me_?" he stammers. "Why--why--"

"Why, why, nothin'!" b.u.t.ts in Alex. "Here's a chance for you to show Miss Evans, your boss, and the rest of the world what's in you. If your boss calls on you for the figures in this thing, then you must know more about it than he does, or anybody else in the office. Can you get him on the phone?"

"But--but I have never sold anything in my life!" says Jared. "You don't understand this thing at all. It requires experience and--oh, it's silly to even think of it! Why--"

"Yeh?" b.u.t.ts in Alex. "What's his number?" He rushes to the phone.

"Say, listen--please!" pleads Jared; "it's not a bit regular and--why, he'd fire me out of hand if I ever did anything like this!"

"The number!" bawls Alex, with the receiver off the hook.

"Riverside 33,312," stammers Jared, wringin' his hands. "But look here, you mustn't--"

Alex gets the number and Jared falls back in a chair, and mutters somethin' about bein' ruined for life. In another minute, Alex is announcin' to somebody that Mr. Jared Rushton wishes to speak to Mr.

Hamilton on a matter of the greatest importance. Jared lets forth a wail like a dyin' fish or the like, and then Alex grabs him by the arms.

"Now, go to it!" he says. "Tell him you want a chance at this contract yourself. Say you know more about it than anyone else and have been plannin' the thing for weeks. You don't _think_ you can land this contract--you _know_ it!"

"But," wails Jared, "I _don't_ know--"

Alex shoves him over to the phone.

Well, the funniest conversation you, I, or anybody else ever heard begins right then and there. Jared starts off kinda weak and tremblin'

and I felt sorry for him, because from his answers it looked like a cinch that he was fired. Pretty soon he gets a little stronger, and in a few minutes he was talkin' like the boss was workin' for _him_! The only way I can figure it is that Alex had hopped him up so much that he got to where he believed himself that he was the only man on earth that could land this contract. When Jared says if he don't get this chance he's gonna quit his job right then and there and the boss can look elsewhere for the estimate figures, I almost fell off the couch, and Alex does a war dance.

Bang! Jared slams down the receiver and swings around on Alex.

"Well," he snaps out, "you've done it! I am to be at the Hotel Dubois at eleven to-morrow to meet the representatives of one of the biggest steel concerns in the country. I'm to take from them a contract running into millions. If I don't get it, I'm fired. If I do get it--well, there's no use talking about that part of it, because I won't!"

With that he sinks into a chair and buries his head in his hands. Alex keeps right on top of him.

"Fine!" he says, rubbin' his hands together. "Now call up Miss Evans and ask her to marry you!"

"What?" shrieks Jared, bouncin' up from his chair. "What is this? A nightmare? You've already probably cost me my job, and now you want to wreck my happiness! I was a fool to listen to you. I--"

"Sure!" says Alex. "Let's get her on the phone right away."

Jared looks wildly around the room and grabs for his hat. Alex pushes him back in a chair.

"Now, you listen to me!" he snarls, all the grin gone from him. "You are at this minute facin' the biggest thing that's ever come into your thirty-five-dollar-a-week life. You got a chance now to rise above the mob. You also got a chance to marry what is the greatest girl in the world, accordin' to your own admission. If you ask her to marry you _before_ you go after this contract and she accepts you, think of the confidence you'll have! Why, boy, if this girl says she'll marry you, they ain't nothin' in New York can stop you from goin' over the top!

Go on! You're all worked up now--go to it before you get cold!"

Jared grabs up the phone receiver, pale as a ghost.

"By heavens!" he says. "I--you--if--Gimme Morningside 77,638, quick!"

Alex closes the door and pulls me into the other room.

"That there's gonna be private," he says.

"Where did you meet this Miss Evans?" I says.

"H'mph!" grunts Alex. "I never seen the girl in my life! Jared simply told me about her, that's all!"

"Well," I says, "you certainly have balled things up. They ain't a doubt in my mind but that you've made that poor boy lose his job; and as far as I can see you're gonna make him lose his girl, too! I'd hate to be you when he staggers away from that phone!"