The Coolidge examiner., 1932-06-03


didn't he make his beginning here?
Why didn't he 90 inside and find
the boss? And say Can interest
you
He turned and walked hastily, al
most furtively, away, as if his de-
sign might have been legible through
the window to the boss-the design,
and the terror, too, that set him on
his way once more, in flight again.
He'd have to do ii some time.
though. He couldn't go back and
face Edith until. at least, he'd tried.
He would try at the next garage he
came TO. After all, they couldn't
do anything to him. They couldn't
even, with rudeness and ridicule.
make him feel any worse than he
felt right now.
All the same, he went by two
more before he tried one. At last
he opened door and went inside.
He took his auto choke out of his
pocket and started in on the first
man he saw.
Can ] interest you :" He
didn't know what he was saying, but
it must have sounded coherent since
the man listened calmly enough; but
after a while he yawned and said,
You'll have to talk to the boss.
amt got nothing to do with it,"
"Is the boss out?" Edward asked.
He thought for an instant he was
going to get a reprieve. but the
man said. "No. here he comes
now" So he had to begin all over
again.
The fog lifted momentariIy while
he talked and he heard himself say
ing things
a customer came in and the boss
was getting uneasy. "Oh. it's all
right, | guess" he said at last. but
there are so many Of those things.
No, don't believe I'm interested.
Nothing doing just now, anyway"
more. He mad known II would come
out like that. What the boss said
was perfectly true; there were un-
counted things to make cars run
better, or more conveniently. being
offered every day.
Well, he'd tried, anyhow, and the
experience hadn't been so bad. BY
comparison with the way he'd felt
when he went into that place, he
was almost elated. He might as
well go on and try other places. He
tried another and another and an
other. He lost count at last; didn't
know how many he had tried. The
thing was so obviously useless. he
was surprised TO find, in the main.
so much good-humored tolerance.
They let him talk. They even
seemed to listen, sometimes for one
minute, sometimes for as many as
five.
The steady repetition of failure
was wearing him down. The mood
of desperation that had driven him
from the Office was once more en-
quilting him. with fatigue, crude
bodily fatigue, on top Of it. He
couldn't go back to the office now.
He was marked legiBly with fail
ure, branded with it.
A queer reminiscence came over
him of the other office; the hand
somely furnished. comfortable Of
fee in the insurance company; Of
himself sitting in the easy chair, die
tating to a smart, neat stenog-
rapher. The queer, almost unbe-
lievable oddity about it was that
he didn't wish himself back there.
Not even now. For the man who
had sat in that easy chair, comfort
ably salaried, secure, exercising an
authority that was unQuestioned as
far as it went, seemed to him not
to have been man at ala SYM
Dol; a stuffed shirt.
He turned into the office of an
other public garage and asked-it
had become a mechanical question
for the boss. Hes busy now."
his informant said with jerk of
the thumb. You'll have to wait q
minute"
Edward drew near and waited.
1t was another salesman who was
talking to the boss, trying to sell
him a newfangled trouble light Ed
ward listened absently at first, but
after a minute or two he noticed
something. The salesman wasn't
saying a word about the merits of
his device. He was talking dis
counts, quoting jobbers' prices.
There was a clean profit of two dol
lars and twenty-five cents in every
individual light the boss could sell.
That was more than a dollar better
than he could hope for under or
binary conditions. He'd better let
him leave a half dozen on con-
signment while he was finding out
what the demand amounted to. The
salesman would come back in a few
days and sell him a real order.
Edward didn't try to mare a sale
in that place. He remembered, now.