I
"Now, if I was running this country," said Paul Manley, lighting a new cigarette, and ending a diatribe against things as they were in the U. S. A. in the year 1920, "I tell you what I'd do! First I'd——"
A customer descended hurriedly from One Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street into Hepp's Bargain Basement where Paul was employed as sales clerk.
"Want a pair of shoes!"
"What kind of shoes?" grumbled Paul. He would have liked his job in Hepp's Bargain Basement well enough if it weren't for customers always coming in and taking his mind off important affairs.
"A good, strong shoe I'm not hard to suit," said the customer, a gray-haired and well-dressed business man.
"You're going to wear them—not me, mister," said Paul, yawning. He rose slowly from the bench at the back of the little shop, and came forward. He was a tall and skinny youth of about twenty.
"Sit down, will you?"
The customer sat down, thrust out his foot, and glanced at the clerk. Manley had walked away toward the shelves. The customer grunted, pulled a foot-rest to him, and began to unlace his shoe.
"I don't want a tan shoe," he said a moment later.
"I'm no mind-reader, mister," said Paul. He slapped the rejected shoe back into the box, and pulled out another pair.
"I don't want a vici kid," said the customer.
"That's the style nowadays."
"I don't care. I don't want it!"
"Well, try it on, can't you?" grumbled Paul. "There, how does it feel?"
"It's too tight That's not my size."
"It certainly is your size! It's a 9-D, and that's what you've got on right now. Don't tell me my business, mister. Look—see? That's your size."
"I say it doesn't fit! And I don't want a vici kid, anyway. I can have a good strong walking shoe if I want it, can't I?"
"Oh, you want a shoe for walking! Why didn't you say so in the first place and save my time? Sure, you can have it; I got no objection. What do you want to pay?"
"About six dollars."
"We don't keep cheap shoes, mister," said Paul, getting up from his knees.
"I don't want a cheap shoe."
"Yes, you do! What do you call a six dollar shoe, if it ain't a cheap shoe? Say, I might sell you one shoe for that."
"Young fellow," growled the customer, pulling on his own shoe again and jabbing viciously at the eyelets, "you couldn't sell me any shoe at all. You need a lesson in good manners, you do!"
"Go along now, mister," said Paul, reclining again on his bench. "You're in the wrong store, see?
"I guess I showed that fresh guy where he got off," he chuckled satisfiedly as the enraged customer went stamping up the iron stairs to One Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street.
"Yah," grunted Ernest Birdsong, his fellow clerk from the ladder where he was sorting stock. Ernest was a recent arrival from Europe.
Paul sprawled on the bench and lit a cigarette, which he "ate" in long, lung-filling inhalations.
"There you go," he went on, "working your fat head off. You'll learn better, or I miss my guess! You're some of this here blamed pauper labor that wants to come here and lower the American standard of living. You ain't got the mind of a free man, Birdy. Go ahead, and work yourself to death, and see what you get for it! Old Hepp doesn't care a whoop for you or for me, except what he can get out of us. I'm telling you. That's where the old tight-wad's head is level; I don't care a whoop for him except for what I can get out of him, see? He's a blood-sucking capitalist, that's what old Hepp is. Pretty soft for him—five stores, and not a blamed thing to do but go around from one to the other, and crash the cash-register!"
"Yah, Mr. Paul," murmured Ernest inattentively.
"Aw, gosh!" yawned Paul. "I'm feeling all in today. Had a big time last night, Birdy. Yep, we had a large time. Punished a quart between three of us, we did. Say, Birdie, I know where I can get genuine Old Cobbler, rye, for six bucks a bottle. You want some good booze?"
"No, Mr. Paul."
"Say, Birdy, I feel like taking in a movie today. There's nothing doing here, and you're going to stay anyhow, ain't you? Old Hepp won't be back until six, or half-past. You can take care of the store by yourself, can't you? I'll do as much for you some time. If old Hepp pops in, you say I got sick, and went around to see a doctor. So long—see you some more. Don't take any wooden money!"