“Would you mind telling me who they are?” Wright asked.
The question appeared to embarrass Smith.
“Why, upon my word, Wright, I don’t exactly know,” he replied. “We got a number of quotations, of course. Barker has been looking after it. Better see him.”
“You’d have the information in the office, wouldn’t you?” Wright pressed.
“I suppose so, I suppose so; but—here, you see Barker. He knows all about it. I don’t. Sorry to leave you, but I’ve got an appointment.” And he left Wright to wait for the senior partner.
When Barker came in, fully two hours later, his surprise at seeing Wright was so much overdone that the latter knew Smith had been talking to him.
“Well, now, look here,” said Barker when Wright had opened the matter, “I don’t want to talk about this. We got a dozen quotations and picked out the one that suited us. That’s all there is to it. I’m not going to tell you where we buy or what we buy for. That’s our business.”
“You said we were underbid, and that’s my business,” said Wright. “I tell you we weren’t.”
“That,” said Barker with first-class indignation, “amounts to a reflection on our veracity.”
“I wouldn’t put it that way,” retorted Wright. “Your letter was a darned poor lie, if you want my opinion of it. Now, hold your horses for a minute while I talk. No one quoted you a better rate then we did; I know that. And I know that transportation charges cut no figure, either. I’m not kicking, understand, but I do want to know why we didn’t land the contract. We’ve done business with you before and hope to do business with you again. Where do we fall down? Why are you throwing it into us? What do we have to figure on besides cost, next time you ask us for a quotation?”