The Ordway new era., 1920-09-17

breath. His eyes now slightly dilated,
sought for billiards.. found them.
darted away again.
That's tough =. mighty tough :.
H.. came up here thinking l might
do something about it Save the sit
uatlon. you know. Too late. is itf"
"A good deal too late"
Harmon exhaled lengthily. and FUN
bled for his invariable cigarette: Hill
lard observed without particular de-
duction, that his hands lacked GER
tainty.
THAT does sort OF burst the bubble.
doesn't 1t? Well l suppose
the next step you want to take is to
get out of town."
NO." said Hilliard. "I'll stay till It's
over with"
Harmon gasped.
stay? Stay here after the news
is out? What for?''
81 hardly think you'd understand
what I'm staying for, Mr.. Harmon"
The fat broker shook his head in
vigorous protest.
Now. look herel' His voice was
paternally kind. you've been a fine
sport through this whole business. eN-
cept once. and we won't let that bother
us now As a salesman you've been
holy wonder. You've done all ex-
pected you'd do, or could do, and then
some. And your fare-up last time
was here don't hurt you with me one
little bit. But here we are at the fin
lsh. My suggestion to you is to pack
your duds and get out. Call 1t day
and quit There's better business
plant yourself in some other good
town. say, Detroit. and"
"No, thanks" Hilliard's smile was
out of genuine humor.
"Well, aren't you open to convlc-
tion?"
No. don't think am. Please
don't argue-that's final.
swell, you're sure you can't do any
more here, aren't you?"
mot nckel's worth-even If i
wanted to. And would you mind get
ting down to brass tacks? Otherwise
! can't see any benefit to either of us
from prolongng this Interview; can
your"
Harmon inspected him carefully and
seemed to be struck with an inspira-
tion
I'm not sure of 1t, at that. Look
here nowl I've got an Ideal Let's
try to get some benefit out of It. Sup
pose you got clear of this mess. Sup
pose we straighten 1t out from top to
bottom. Everybody satisfied. Sup
pose you got out of it absolutely clean;
do you think you could take your ex-
perlence and your front and your en-
ergy and cash in on some better busl-
nessY
HillIard exclaimed aloud; he could
hardly credit his ears.
"What's that?" he managed. 81
don't understand!
The brokers' eyes frightened. "Its
easy enough II You put your mind to 1t.
I've told you before" he said impress
sively, "Fm out for results. That's my
middle name-R-E-sults. And not re-
suits from minute to minute, but re-
suits in the long run. Now 1t does
seem to me like an awful shame to
have you come I'D here and spend all
this time anu money fiub-dubbing
around. and then have 1t all over
with, and nothing to show for 1t but
lot of bellyaching customers. OF
course we've made little money. hut
when we let this scheme wind up In
big howl from everybody we've got
into It we're losing the cumulative
value of you. And it's you that was
the backbone OF the whole idea. Now
this is only passing thought, but let's
consider it-which way would be the
best for us in the long run. to close
up this deal and get out from under
and take little profit and be in dutch
here forever, or to be couple of phil
anthropists and play strong for the
future?"
"How do you mean?" Hilliard was
af1re with hope.
The brokers' smile was every mo-
ment more broadly ingratiatlng.
"Why, suppose should hand you
back every cent you've collected and
paid In. This is just suggestion-I
want your opinion on 1t. You go
round to your subscribers; tell 'em
the mine isn't as promising as you
thought it was; you're going to make
good; give 'em their money back.
Now-if you did that and left first
class impression everywhere, could you
start from scratch all over again and
sell enough honest-to-goodness conser-
vative stuff-municipals or like that
to those same people to make up the
difference?" He was studying his
companion keenly.