When I got down to breakfast one morning the Mater was there with a letter in her hand which had a Florida post-mark on it. Her face was very grave.

"Hullo, Mater," I said; then, noticing the envelope, "Nothing wrong, I hope?"

"Why, no; but I've got a little disappointment for you."

"Betty isn't sick again?" I asked anxiously.

"Now, don't worry, my dear," she said; "but I want you to let me tell you"—here she hesitated and looked at me for a moment, then shook her head sorrowfully and under her breath said, "Poor boy!"

"Good gracious, Mother, tell me quickly what it is!"

"There, there, sit down."

I sat down. My throat felt parched. Mother's remarks made me think all kinds of dreadful things had happened to my Betty. She stood behind my chair and put her arms on my shoulders and said: "Well, my poor boy, your time of ease will soon be over. Betty will be home next Wednesday." I felt as if a ton of bricks had been taken off my chest, and at once forgave Mother for her joke.

I had just bought three electric vacuum cleaners, and Larsen thought I was crazy."Retail at thirty-five dollars!" he said.

"Cost me twenty-two," I retaliated.

"H'm!"

"Besides," I continued, "remember that we are going to dominate the electrical supply field."

"And toilet articles—don't forget them," Larsen laughed.

That was his hobby; and it was a hobby that meant dollars and cents to me, for that business was growing steadily all the time.

We had even added toilet soap, because we had been asked for it several times. People came in to leave their safety razors to be sharpened and then bought a stick of shaving soap, and also asked if we had any toilet soap. So, right or wrong, we had gone into it. Martin had the right idea. "If you can make profit out of it it's all right."

Coming back to our vacuum cleaners, I had felt that we ought to have everything electrical, just so that we could dominate the field. I might have been wrong in my reasoning, but that was how it struck me. I had asked Martin if he didn't agree with me.

"I most surely do, Mr. Black," he said. "I think you have the right idea on that, and I think you will sell some vacuum cleaners." He pursed his lips, a habit he had when thinking, then added, "And, even if you don't sell them, you can make a good profit out of them."

Larsen shot him a questioning look.

"In fact," continued Martin, "when you think it over, you might decide not to bother to sell them at all, but just rent them during the spring cleaning time, which is coming on very soon. You ought to be able rent them for a dollar a day, without any trouble. I think that in sixty days you can rent those machines so that they wouldn't cost you anything."

That was on Monday, and in the evening we had quite an interesting discussion at our "directors'" meeting.

Jones suggested that we could send a man to work the vacuum cleaners, and then, while he was in the house he could sell the woman other things.

"That certainly is a very interesting suggestion," said Martin, "and possibly could be worked. But there's one difficulty. All the ads. of the vacuum cleaner show women and children operating the machine. If we suggested that a man ought to work it, they might wonder what is wrong with the machine—or with us. Besides, Mr. Black, don't you think it would take us too much from our regular work, so that, either there or here, we would have to have extra help?"

After I thought the matter was dropped, Martin said, "Do you think that one dollar is sufficient to charge for a day's use of that machine? Don't you think we can get two dollars just as easily? Also remember that, if the machine has been out one day, from our point of view it becomes unsalable as a new machine."

"Do you think they will stand for that much?" asked Jones.

"Oh, yes," I chimed in, "I'm sure they will. It is going to save the women two or three days' work; and, as you know, many people hire a man or woman to come for a day to beat the rugs, and they can't get anybody under two dollars a day, and it usually takes them a day to do the job."

So we decided to charge two dollars a day for the rent of the vacuum cleaners.

Charlie Martin suggested that we ought to get up an ad. for the sweeper service. I thought that Fellows ought to do it, but Charlie was so insistent that I told him to go ahead with it.

Jimmy gave us an idea which I thought was pretty good. "Say, Boss," he said, "couldn't we sell baseball goods?"

"Barlow has always handled those," I said, "and—and—" I trailed off to nothing, because I realized that, because Barlow handled these, it was no reason why I should not, and, if I stopped handling everything he did, I would have very few goods in the store. I had had to give up the idea of farm implements, because of the big hold he had on that business, and the amount of money it required to carry the necessary stock.

"I'm captain of the Little Tigers," broke in Jimmie, "and if yer put in baseball goods, why I can get all our gang to buy from here—and, say, I know a couple o' kids that would like to go and see the captains of the other kids' teams around here—especially if you were to give a little rake off."

We all laughed—except Larsen. "That's one of the best suggestions Jimmie ever give us," he said, "Let his pals sell for a commission. They get business we never get."

Here Martin broke in, "I know a house in Boston that would supply us with all the catalogs we wanted, and we could sell from catalog if necessary, and they would give us a substantial discount for any orders we sent them."

"Write to them, Charlie," I said, "and see what they'll do."

What a tremendous lot of different lines there are which a retail store can handle—even if only for a brief season each year—and make some profit out of them! But you sure do have to keep on the jump to think of them all. I know my store would never have been handling the number of lines that we had then, if it hadn't been for the Monday meetings. These meetings seemed to tone up all of us, and, once we had gone on record to do something, we seemed to strive hard to live up to it, so that we wouldn't let the other fellows have the laugh on us, which they certainly would if we had fallen down. It was at that meeting that I suggested a motto. It was this:

"Eternal humping is the price of Success."

I asked Charlie Martin what he thought of it. He said, "It's fine, and if you used the word vigilance instead of humping—why you would be only about twenty-five hundred years behind the fellow who originated it!"

The day Betty was to return I was at the station at 3:30, although her train wasn't due 'till 3:55—and then the train was fifteen minutes late! How I fumed and fretted at the inefficiency of our railroad service, but I forgot all that when the train finally puffed into the station, and Betty tripped out of the car, right into my arms. I can't express the happiness I experienced—all the hundred and one things we had to talk over—all the foolish little stunts we did, just like a couple of kids—but both of us supremely happy! I extend my heartfelt commiseration to those poor benighted wights who don't possess a wife.