It'll be two dollars to
you, seem's you got sich a purty girl in the buggy."
The girl giggled, Jim flushed, and fished out two one-dollar bills,
which he passed over to Scattergood. Then, whip in hand, he drove off
with a flourish. Scattergood pocketed the money serenely. It was by
methods such as this that he did, in his hardware store, double the
business such a store in such a locality normally accounted for.
Scattergood's most outstanding quality was that he never let a business
opportunity slip--large or small--and that he manufactured for himself
fully half of his business opportunities. He had lifted retail
salesmanship to the rank of an art.
Again he got up and went inside, where he wrote a letter to a certain
wholesale house with whom his account was large. The letter said he had
pressing need for half a dozen railroad rails of certain size and
weight, and didn't know where to get them, and would the recipient find
them and ship them at once.
Presently Tim Plant, teamster, drove by, and Scattergood hailed him.
"Tim," he said, "you owe me a leetle bill. This hain't a dun, but I got
a mite of work to be done, and seein' things wasn't brisk with you, I
figgered you might want to work it out--jest to keep busy.
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