Also, he made a friend, for Lem could not
be convinced but Scattergood had done him a notable favor.
Scattergood now had money in the bank. No longer did he have to stretch
his credit for stock. He was established--and all in less than a year.
Hardware, it seemed, had been a commodity much needed in that locality,
yet no one had handled it in sufficient stock because of the
twenty-four-mile haul. That had been too costly. It cost Scattergood
just as much, but his customers paid for it.... The difference between
him and the other merchants was that he sold goods while they allowed
folks to buy.
So, wisely, he kept on building up in a small way, while waiting for
bigger things to develop. And as he waited he studied the valley until
he could recite every inch of it, and he studied the future until he
knew what the future would require of that valley. He knew it before the
future knew it and before the valley knew it, and was laying his plans
to be ready with pails to catch the sap when others, taken by surprise,
would be running wildly about seeking for buckets.
Then Crane and Keith arrived in Coldriver.... That day marked
Scattergood's emergence from the ranks of country merchants, though he
retained his hardware store to the last.
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