The Fortune Hunter
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Louis Joseph Vance >> The Fortune Hunter
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"And in a week they'd think they were over-paying me," Duncan argued.
"No--I've been there. Why not try me on here?"
"Well, I'm just a little bit afraid you wouldn't learn much, my boy. I
don't do business enough to give you a good idea of it. Sothern and Lee
get all the trade nowadays."
"But look here, sir: don't you think if I came in here perhaps we could
build up the business?"
"No, I'm afraid not," Graham deprecated, pursing his lips and rubbing
the white stubble of his beard with a toil-worn thumb.
Duncan eyed him in bitter humour. "No, of course not. You're right--but
somebody must have tipped you off."
Graham paid little heed, whose mind was bent upon his own parlous
circumstances. "I haven't got capital enough to stock up the store," he
explained; "that's the real trouble. Folks have got into the habit of
going to the other store because I'm out of so many things."
"Well, to be sure," said Duncan, a little dashed; "you can't expect to
do business unless you've got things to sell...."
"I don't expect it, my boy," Sam assented dolefully. "'Twouldn't be in
reason.... You see," he added, hope lightening his gloom, "I'm working
on an invention of mine, and if that should work out I'd get some money
and be able to get a fresh stock. Then I'd be glad to have you."
Duncan brushed this impatiently aside. "How much business are you doing
here now?"
"Some days"--Graham reckoned it on his fingers--"I take in a dollar or
two, and some days... nothing.... There's my sody fountain," he said
with a jerk of a thumb toward it: "got that fixed up a little while
ago, and it's bringing in a little. Not much. You see, I need more
syrups. I've only got vanilly now."
"Soda water!" Duncan jumped at the idea. "Hold on! All the girls round
here drink soda, don't they?"
"Oh, yes," said Graham abstractedly.
The thought infused new life into the younger man's waning purpose.
"Mr. Graham, I wish you'd let me come in here for a while. I don't care
about wages."
Graham lifted his shoulders resignedly. "Well, my boy, it don't seem
right, but if you really want to work here for nothing, I'll be glad to
have you; and if things look up with me, I'll be glad to pay you."
Abruptly he found his hand grasped and pumped gratefully.
"That's mighty good of you, Mr. Graham. When can I start?"
"Why... whenever you like."
In a twinkling Duncan's hat and gloves were off. "I'd like to, now," he
said. "Where can we get more syrups?"
"Unfortunately... I'll have to buy them."
"How much?" Duncan's hand was in his pocket in an instant.
"Oh, no, you mustn't do that." Sam backed away in alarm. "I couldn't
allow it, my boy. It's good of you, but..."
"Either," Nat told himself, "I'm asleep or someone's refusing to take
money from me." He grinned cheerfully. "Oh, that's all right," he
contended aloud. "I'll draw it down as soon as we begin to sell soda."
He selected a bill from his slender store. "Will five dollars be
enough?"
"Oh, yes, but it wouldn't be right for me to--"
But by this time Duncan was pressing the bill into his hand.
"Nonsense!" he insisted. "How can we build up trade without syrup?"
"But--but--"
"And how can I learn the business without trade?" He closed Graham's
unwilling fingers over the money and skipped away.
Sighing, Graham gave over the unequal argument. "Well, if you're
satisfied, my boy.... But I'll have to write to Elmiry for it."
"Telegraph."
"Telegraph!" Graham laughed. "That'd kill Lew Parker, I guess."
"Who's he?"
"Telegraph operator and ticket agent."
"Well, he won't be missed much. Telegraph and tell 'em to send the
goods C.O.D. Please, Mr. Graham. We want to get things moving here, you
know; we've got to build up the business. We'll put out some signs and
... and ... well, we'll get the people in the habit of coming here
somehow. You'll see!"
He raked the poverty-stricken shelves with a calculating eye, all his
energy fired by enthusiasm at the prospect of doing something. Graham
watched him with kindling liking and admiration. His old lips quivered
a little before he voiced his thought.
"You--you know, my boy, you've got splendid business ability," he
asserted with whole-souled conviction.
Duncan almost reeled. "What?" he cried.
"I was just saying, you have wonderful business ability."
"You're the first man that ever said that. I wonder if it's so."
"I'm sure of it."
"Well," said Nat, chuckling, "I'll write that to my chum. He'll--"
"Oh, I can tell," Graham interrupted. "Now, I ... Well, you see, I've
been a failure in business. So far as that goes, I've been a failure in
everything all my life."
Duncan stared for a moment, then offered his hand. "For luck," he
explained, meeting Graham's puzzled gaze as his hand was taken.
Wondering, Graham shook his head; and gratitude made his old voice
tremulous. He put a hand over Duncan's, patting it gently.
"I want you to know, my boy, that I appreciate..." His voice broke.
"It's mighty kind of you to buy the syrup--very kind--"
"Nothing of the sort; it's just because I've got great business
ability." Duncan laughed quietly and moved away. "We'll want to clean
up a bit," said he; "got a broom? I'll raise the dust a bit while
you're out sending that wire."
"You'll find one in the cellar, I guess, but--your clothes--"
"Oh, that's all right. Where's the cellar?"
"Underneath," Graham told him simply, taking down a battered hat from a
hook behind the counter.
"I know; but how do I get there?"
"By the steps; you go through that door there into the hall. The steps
are under the stairs to our rooms. I live above the store, you see."
"Yes.... Good-bye, Mr. Graham."
"Good-bye, my boy."
Duncan watched the old man move slowly out of sight, then with a groan
sat down on the counter to think it over. "It wouldn't be me if I
didn't make a mess of things somehow," he told himself bitterly. "Now
you have gone and went and done it, Mr. Fortune Hunter. You stand a
swell chance of getting away with the goods when you take a wageless
job in a spavined country drug-store with no trade worth mentioning and
nothing to draw it with... just because that old duffer's the only
human being you've spotted in this burg!...
"Wonder what Harry would say if he heard about that wonderful business
ability thing...
"But what in thunder can we do to bring business to this bum joint?"
He raked his surroundings with a discouraged glance.
"Oh," he said thoughtfully, "hell!"
Five minutes later Ben Sperry found him in the same position, his head
bent in perplexed reverie. Sperry had been travelling for Gresham and
Jones, a wholesale drug-house in Elmira, more years than I can
remember. His friendship for Sam Graham, contracted during the days
when Graham's was the drug-store of Radville, has survived the decay of
the business. He's a square, decent man, Sperry, and has wasted many an
hour trying to persuade Sam to pay a little more attention to the
business. I suspect he suffered the shock of his placid life when he
found Sam absent and the shop in the care of this spruce, well set-up
young man.
"Anything I can do for you?" chirped Duncan cheerfully, dropping off
the counter as Sperry entered.
"No-o; I just wanted to see old Sam. Is he upstairs?"
"No, Mr. Graham's not in at present," Duncan told him civilly.
Sperry wrinkled his brows over this problem. "You working here?" he
asked.
"Yes, sir."
"Well, I'll be hanged!"
"Let us hope not," said Duncan pleasantly. He waited a moment, a little
irritated. "Sure there's nothing _I_ can do for you?"
"No-o," said Sperry slowly, struggling to comprehend. "Thank you just
the same."
"Not at all." Duncan turned away.
"You see," Sperry pursued, "I don't buy from drug-stores: I sell to
'em."
Duncan faced about with new interest in the man. "Yes?" he said
encouragingly.
"My card," volunteered Sperry, fishing the slip of pasteboard from his
waistcoat pocket. He dropped his sample case beside the stove and
plumped down in the chair, to the peril of its existence. "I don't make
this town very often," he pursued, while Duncan studied his card.
"Sothern and Lee are the only people I sell to here, but I never miss a
chance to chin a while with old Sam. So, having half an hour before
train time, I thought I'd drop in."
"Mr. Graham doesn't order from your house, then?"
"Doesn't order from anybody, does he?"
"I don't know; I've just come here. He'll be sorry to have missed you,
though. He's just stepped out to wire your house--I gather from the
fact that it's in Elmira; he mentioned that town, not the firm
name--for some syrups."
"You don't mean it!" Sperry gasped. "What's struck him all of a sudden?
He ain't put in any new stock for ten years, I reckon."
"Well, you see," Duncan explained artfully, "I've persuaded him, in a
way, to try to make something out of the business here. We're going to
do what we can, of course, in a small way at first."
Sperry wagged a dubious head. "I dunno," he considered. "Sam's a nice
old duffer, but he ain't got no business sense and never had; you can
see for yourself how he's let everything run to seed here. Sothern and
Lee took all his trade years ago."
"Yes, I know; that's why he needs me," said Duncan brazenly. In his
soul he remarked "O Lord!" in a tone of awe; his colossal impudence
dazed even himself. "But don't you think he could get back some of the
trade if the store was stocked up?"
"No doubt about that at all," Sperry averred; "he'd get the biggest
part of it."
"You think so?"
"Sure of it. You see, everybody round here likes Sam, and Sothern and
Lee have always been outsiders. They'd swing to this shop in a minute,
just on account of that. Fact is, I wasted a lot of talk on our firm a
couple of years ago, trying to make our people give him some credit,
but they couldn't see it. He owed them a bill then that was so old it
had grown whiskers."
"And still owes it, I presume?"
"You bet he still owes it. Always will. It's so small that it ain't
worth while suing for----"
"Look here, Mr. Sperry, how much is this bill with the whiskers?"
"About fifty dollars, I think," said the travelling man, fumbling for
his wallet. "I'm supposed to ask for payment every time I strike town,
you know, so I always have it with me; but I haven't had the heart to
say a word to Sam for a good long time.... Here it is."
Duncan studied carefully the memorandum: "To Mdse, as per bill
rendered, $47.85." "I wonder..." he murmured.
"Eh?" said Sperry.
"I was wondering:... Suppose you were to tell your people that there's
a young fellow here who'd like to give this store a boom.... Say he
wants a little credit because--because Mr. Graham won't let him put in
any cash----"
"Not a bit of use," Sperry negatived. "I would, myself, but the
house--no."
"But suppose I pay this bill----"
"Pay it? You really mean that?"
"Certainly I mean it." Duncan produced the wad of bills which Kellogg
had furnished him the night before his departure from New York. Thus
far he had broken only one of the five-hundred-dollar gold
certificates, and of that one he had the greater part left; living is
anything but expensive in Radville.
"I'm beginning to understand that I was cut out for an actor," he told
himself as he thumbed the roll with a serious air and an assumed
indifference which permitted Sperry to estimate its size pretty
accurately.
"That's quite a stack of chips you're carrying," Sperry observed.
Duncan's hand airily wafted the remark into the limbo of the
negligible. "A trifle, a mere trifle," he said casually. "I don't
generally carry much cash about me. Haven't for five years," he added
irrepressibly. He extracted a fifty-dollar certificate from the sheaf,
and handed it over.
"I'll take a receipt, but you needn't mention this to Mr. Graham just
now."
"No, certainly not." Sperry scrawled his signature to the bill.
"And about that line of credit?----"
"Well, with this paid, I guess you could have what you needed, in
moderation. Of course----"
"My name is Duncan--Nathaniel Duncan." Sperry made a memorandum of it
on the back of an envelope. "Any former business connections?"
"None that I care to speak about," Duncan confessed glumly.
Sperry's face lengthened. "No references?"
It took thought, and after thought courage; but Duncan hit upon the
solution at length. "Do you know L. J. Bartlett & Company, the
brokers?"
"Do I know J. Pierpont Morgan?"
"Then that's all right. Tell your people to inquire of Harry Kellogg,
the junior partner. He knows all about me."
Noting the name, Sperry put away the envelope. "That's enough. If he
says you're all right, you can have anything you want." He consulted
his watch. "Hmm. Train to catch.... But let's see: what do you need
here?"
Duncan reviewed the empty shelves, his face glowing. "Pills," he said
with a laugh: "all kinds of pills and... everything for a regular,
sure-enough drug-store, Mr. Sperry: everything Sothern and Lee carries
and a lot of attractive things they don't.... Small lots, you know,
until I see what we can sell."
"I see. You leave it to me; I probably know what you need better than
you do. I'll make out a list this afternoon and mail it to-night with
instructions to ship it at the earliest possible moment."
"Splendid!" Duncan told him. "You do that, and don't worry about our
making good. I'm going to put all my time and energy into this
proposition and----"
"Then you'll make good all right," Sperry assured him. "All anybody's
got to do is look at you to see you're a good business man." He
returned Duncan's pressure and picked up his sample-case. "S'long,"
said he, and left briskly, leaving Duncan speechless.
As if to assure himself of his sanity he put a hand to his brow and
stroked it cautiously. "Heavens!" he said, and sought the support of
the counter. "That's twice to-day I've been told that in the same
place!"...
"It's funny," he said, half dazed, "I never could have pulled that off
for myself!"
IX
SMALL BEGINNINGS
Presently Duncan moved and came out of his abstraction. "I'd better get
that broom," he said slowly. "The place certainly needs some expert
manicuring before we get that new stock in.... By George, I really
begin to believe we've got a chance to do something, after all!...
"Or else I'm dreaming...."
He opened the back door and entered a narrow and dark hallway, almost
stumbling over the lowest step of a flight of stairs communicating with
the upper storey. From above he could hear a clatter of crockery,
sounds of footsteps, a woman singing softly.
"Graham's wife, I presume. Never struck me he might be married....
Well, I'll be quiet. If she catches me now, before we're introduced,
she'll take me for a burglar."
On tiptoes he found the descent to the cellar, where by the aid of a
match he discovered a floorbrush whose reasons for retirement from
active employment were most evident even to his inexpert eye. None the
less nothing better offered, and he took it back with him to the shop.
Graham's tinkering was never of a cleanly sort; the floor was thick
with a litter of rubbish--shavings, old nuts and bolts, bits of scrap
tin and metal, torn paper, charred ends of matches: an indescribable
mess. Duncan surveyed it ruefully, but with the will to do strong in
him, took off his coat, turned up his trousers, and fell to. The
disposition of the sweepings troubled him far less than the dust he
raised; obviously the only place to put it was behind the counters.
"Nobody'll see it there," he said in a glow of satisfaction, pausing
with the room half cleared. "I always wondered what they did with that
sort of truck--under the beds, I suppose. Funny Graham never thought of
this, himself--it's so blame' easy."
He resumed his labours, thrilled with the sensation of accomplishment.
"One thing at least that I can do," he mused; "never again shall I fear
starvation... so long as there's a broom handy." Absorbed he brushed
away, raising a prodigious amount of dust and utterly oblivious to the
fact that he was observed.
Two shadows moved slowly athwart the windows, to which his back was
turned, paused, moved on out of sight, returned. It was only during a
pause for breath that he became aware of the surveillance.
Straightening up, he looked, gasped and fled for the back of the store.
"Heavens!" he whispered, aghast to recognise Josie Lockwood and Angie
Tuthill, of whose ubiquitous shadows in his way he had been conscious
so frequently within the past several days. "I _thought_ I must
have made an impression.... Don't tell me they're coming in!"
Behind the counter he struggled furiously into his coat. "They are," he
said with a sinking heart; "and I'll bet a dollar my face is dirty!"
Notwithstanding these misgivings, it was a very self-possessed young
man, to all appearances, who moved sedately round the end of the
counter to greet these possible customers. His bow was a very passable
imitation of the real thing, he flattered himself; and there's no
manner of doubt but that it flattered the two prettiest and most
forward young women in Radville of that day.
"May I have the honour of waiting on you, ladies?" he inquired with all
the suavity of an accomplished salesman.
Josie and Angie sidled together, giggling and simpering, quite overcome
by his manner. A muffled "How de do?" from Angie and a half-strangled
echo of the salutation from the other were barely articulate. But
hearing them he bowed again, separately to each.
"Good-afternoon," said he, and waited in an inquiring pose.
"This--'this is Mr. Duncan, isn't it?" inquired Josie, controlling
herself.
"Yes, and you are Miss Lockwood, if I'm not mistaken?"
Renewed giggles prefaced her: "Oh, how _did_ you know?"
"Could anyone remain two weeks in Radville and not hear of Miss
Lockwood?"
The shot told famously. "How nice of you! Mr. Duncan, I want you to
meet my friend, Miss Tuthill."
"I've had the honour of admiring Miss Tuthill from a distance," Duncan
assured the younger woman. And, "She'll burn up!" he feared secretly,
watching the conflagration of blushes that she displayed. "Just think
of getting away with a line of mush like that! Harry was right after
all: this is a country town, all right."
"And--and are you working here, Mr. Duncan?" Josie pursued.
"I'm supposed to be; I'm afraid I don't know the business very well, as
yet."
"Oh, that's awf'ly nice," Angle thought.
He thanked her humbly.
"We didn't expect to see you here," Josie assured him. "We just thought
we'd like some soda."
"Soda!" he parroted, horrified. He cast a glance askance at the tawdry
fountain. "Let's see: how d'you work the infernal thing?" he asked
himself, utterly bewildered.
"Yes," Angie chimed in; "it's so warm this afternoon, we----"
"I've got to put it through somehow," he thought savagely. And aloud,
"Yes, certainly," he said, and smiled winningly. "Will you be pleased
to step this way?"
Out of the corners of his eyes he detected the amused look that passed
between the girls. "Oh, very well!" he said beneath his breath. "You
may laugh, but you asked for soda, and soda you shall have, my dears,
if you die of it." He put himself behind the counter with an air of
great determination, and leaned upon it with both hands outspread until
he realised that this was the pose of a groceryman. "What'll you have?"
he demanded genially. "Er--that is--I mean, would you prefer vanilla
or--ah--soda?"
A chant antiphonal answered him:
"I hate vanilla."
"And so do I."
"Oh, don't say that!" he pleaded. "Of course you know there's--ah--
vanilla and vanilla..., Ah... some vanilla I know is detestable, but
when you get a really fine vintage--ah--imported vanilla, it's quite
another matter--ah--particularly at his season of the year----"
His confusion was becoming painful.
"Oh, is it?" asked Josie helpfully. Her eyes dwelt upon his with a
confiding expression which he later characterised as a baby stare; and
he was promptly reduced to babbling idiocy.
"Indeed it is; no doubt whatever, Miss Lockwood. Especially just now,
you know--ah--after the bock season--ah--I mean, when the weather is--
is--in a way--you might put it--vanilla weather."
"But I like chocolate best," Angle pouted. And he hated her consumedly
for the moment.
"Very well," Josie told him sweetly, "I'll have the vanilla."
He thanked her with unnecessary effusion and turned to inspect the
glassware. There could be no mistake about the right jar, however;
there was nothing but vanilla, and seizing it he removed the metal cap
and placed it before the girls. With less ease he discovered a whiskey
glass and put it beside the bottle, with a cordial wave of the hand.
A pause ensued. Duncan was smiling fatuously, serene in the belief that
he had solved the problem: the way to serve soda was to make them help
themselves. It was very simple. Only they didn't... With a start he
became sensible that they were eyeing him strangely.
"You--ah--wanted vanilla, did you not?"
"Yes, thanks, vanilla," Josie agreed.
"Well, that's it," he said firmly, indicating the jar and the glass.
Josie giggled. "But I don't want to drink it clear. You put the syrup
in the glass, you know, and then the soda."
"Oh, I see! You want to make a high-ba--ah--a long drink of it. Ah,
yes!" He procured a glass of the regulation size. "Now I understand." A
pause. "If you'll be good enough to help yourself to the syrup."
"No; you do it," Josie pleaded.
"Certainly." He lifted the whiskey-glass and the jar and began to pour.
"If you'll just say when."
"What? Oh, that's enough, thank you."
"If I ever get out of this fix, I'll blow the whole shooting match," he
promised himself, holding the glass beneath the faucet and fiddling
nervously with the valves. For a moment he fancied the tank must be
empty, for nothing came of his efforts. Then abruptly the fixture
seemed to explode. "A geyser!" he cried, blinded with the dash of
carbonated water and syrup in his face, while he fumbled furiously with
the valves.
As unexpectedly as it had begun the flow ceased. He put down the glass,
found his handkerchief and mopped his dripping face. When able to see
again he discovered the young women leaning against one of the
show-cases, weak with laughter but at a safe remove.
"Our soda's so strong, you know," he apologised. "But if you'll stay
where you are, I'll try again."
Warned by experience, he worked at the machine gingerly, finally
producing a thin, spluttering trickle. Beaming with triumph, he looked
up. "I think it's safe now," he suggested; "I seem to have it under
control."
Angie and Josie returned, torn by distrust but unable to resist the
fascination of the stranger in our village. And there's no denying the
boy was good-looking and a gentleman by birth: a being alien to their
experience of men.
He had filled one glass and was tincturing it with syrup when he caught
again that confiding smile of Josie's, full upon him as the beams of a
noon-day sun.
"Haven't we seen you at church, Mr. Duncan?" she said prettily.
"I think, perhaps, you may have," he conceded. "I have seen you, both."
The second glass (for he was determined that Angie should not escape)
took up all his attention for an instant. "Do you have to go, too?" he
inquired out of this deep preoccupation.
"What?"
"I mean, do you attend regularly?" he amended hastily.
"Oh, yes, of course," Josie simpered, accepting the glass he offered
her. "You make it a rule to go every Sunday, don't you, Mr. Duncan?"
He permitted himself an indiscretion, secure in the belief it would
pass unchallenged: "It's one of the rules, but I didn't make it."
"Did you know there was a vacancy in the choir?" Angle asked, taking up
her glass.
"Choir?"
"Yes," Josie chimed in; "we were hoping you'd join. I want you to,
awfully."
"We're both in the choir," Angie explained.
"And all the girls want you to join. Don't they, Angie?"
"Oh, yes, indeed; they're all just dying to meet you."
"I'll have to write and ask," he said abstractedly.
"Why, what do you mean by that?"
Josie's question struck him dumb with consternation. He made curious
noises in his throat, and fancied (as was quite possible) that they
eyed him in a peculiar fashion. "It's--I mean--a little trouble with my
throat," he managed to lie, at length. "I must ask my physician if I
may, first."
"Oh, I see," said Josie.
"But," he hastened to change the subject, "you're not drinking, either
of you. I sincerely hope it's not so very bad."
Angie replaced her glass, barely tasted. "Do you like it, Josie?"
To Josie's credit it must be admitted that she made a brave attempt to
drink. But the mixture was undoubtedly flat, stale and unprofitable.
She sighed, put it back on the counter, and rose to the emergency.
"Mine's perfectly lovely"--with a ravishing smile--"but it's not very
sweet."
"I made them dry for you--thought you'd like 'em that way," he
stammered. "Perhaps you'd like 'em better if I put a collar on 'em?"
The chorus negatived this suggestion very promptly.
"Why don't you try a glass, Mr. Duncan?" Angie added with malice.
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