"You are--how long are you going to continue selling tea?"

"Only until this lot is sold out."

"I'll tell you what," said Purkes, brightening up, "I'll buy your tea of you and you buy my enamelware."

"We don't sell seconds in enamelware, Mr. Purkes, so your enamelware is useless to us."

"Very well, I will continue to sell enamelware."

"We quite expected you would, Mr. Purkes. We are not going to sell tea after we have cleaned out this one lot, however."

"But by the time you've sold out that one lot you will have established such a ridiculous price that I probably will have to cut my price to satisfy the people. Why, the stuff costs you more than you sell it for."

"Guess we're satisfied with what we are making out of tea, Charlie, aren't we?"

"Yes," he answered, "but I think we are going to do even better on the Cross Tree jams."

These jams were the most advertised in the country, and Purkes was the local agent for them.

The little chap let off a scream. "I'll stop you getting them!" he cried. "I'll sue you!--I'll--!" He stopped abruptly and asked, "Where did you get them?"

"From the plumber's!" said Charlie, "Where did you think?"

"But you can't get them--I've the sole agency."

"In that case," I returned, "you've nothing to worry about, have you?"

The outcome of it was, however, that Purkes promised to take his enamelware off sale at once and get the manufacturers to take it back--even at a loss---or, failing that, to sell his stock to some store outside of Farmdale. We in return were to sell him our tea at forty cents a pound. The little chap kicked at this, but he agreed.

Having got the matter fixed up, he said, "There now, that's settled, thank goodness. It isn't nice to have disputes among friends, is it?

I'll send my man up for that tea this afternoon, so that you won't be bothered to send it down," and he peered over his spectacles and smiled benignly.

"We will let you have the tea as soon as your enamelware has left town.

Until then we will keep it here, in case we need it," I replied.

"What, don't you trust me?" he exclaimed.

Here I forgot myself, for I turned round sharply and said: "I do _not_!

I'm almost sorry that you agreed to get rid of that enamelware, for, by heaven, there's a good profit in groceries, and it wouldn't take me more than two minutes to get into that line myself!"

Old Purkes went white to the gills and a.s.sured me hastily that he would get the enamelware out of town as quickly as possible.

I felt so stuck on myself when he left the store that I wanted to stand on the counter and crow.

"You threw a good bluff," said Charlie, after Purkes had left.

"What do you mean--bluff?" said I, surprised. "No bluff there. I meant every word of it!"

"Even to starting a grocery business?"

"Aw, that," I said sheepishly. "It was a bit foolish because, while business is booming with us, I find that every little bit of extra profit I make has to go into stock. So, as regards actual cash, I am no better off than I was six months ago. However, bluff or no bluff, I really think we've killed the grocer's compet.i.tion."

I wonder more retail merchants don't retaliate in this way on merchants in other lines who make this kind of compet.i.tion. Perhaps they don't because they don't want to offend a fellow townsman. They forget, however, that their fellow townsman doesn't hesitate to offend them.

Pat Burke came into the store that afternoon and introduced himself to me, saying, "Roger Burns sent me, as he wanted me to know you."

He was a short, thick-set man, and spoke on generalities for a little while.

"How's business coming along?" I asked him.

"Very well indeed," he said.

"How did you find the business when you took it over from Stigler?"

Without any expression on his face at all he said, "Just about what we expected."

"What do you think of Stigler?" I asked him.

He didn't say anything for a minute, but let his eyes roam around the store.

"I certainly like the way you have your electrical goods displayed, Mr.

Black," he said. "You have a good trimmer, whoever he is."

"I do it myself."

"The d.i.c.kens you do!" he commented. "Well, that is one of the most attractive displays I have seen in a long while. I want to compliment you. If you were in Boston or New York you would give up running a store of your own, and be head of the decorative department of some big department store. Do you know that some of those head window trimmers make as much as five thousand dollars a year?"

We got on a general discussion of window tr.i.m.m.i.n.g.

"Well, I've got to get back to the store," he finally said. "When you have an evening at liberty I should like to have a chat with you. I think we ought to be able to help each other."

It was not until he had gone that I realized that he had never answered my question relative to Stigler. He put it off as neatly as anything I ever saw.

CHAPTER x.x.xVIII

A LOGICAL PROFIT-SHARING PLAN

I had pledged myself to a profit-sharing plan with my small staff for the year beginning June 1, since my fiscal year would end with the last day of May.

Think of it! By the end of May I would have finished my first year in business. When I looked back at the year's experiences, I realized that I surely had learned a lot in that short time. I had learned more each month than I had learned in all the time I was a clerk. The reason was, I suppose, because I _had_ to learn, whereas, while a clerk, I had had neither the inclination to learn nor the encouragement. I think bosses make a mistake in not encouraging their people to study the business.

Now, I want to tell about my profit-sharing plan. For almost two weeks I had been spending nearly every night with Jock McTavish, the accountant who had helped me out so much in the past. I had told him what I wanted, and we had worked out a plan between us. Jock was Scotch and old-fashioned. I sometimes called him glue fingers, because whenever he got his hand on money it stuck to him.

"Aw, weel, noo," said Jock, "dinna fash yersel', mon! Ye may talk aboot yer pheelantropy an' yer wantin' ta help yer fella creeters, but you maun ken that you canna be doin' it unless ye fir-rst get the baubees.