The antics Palmer cut while delivering this couplet were truly amusing. Palmer was an actor. Placing his hand on Alfred's shoulder, gazing into his face, he continued:
"Just at the age twixt boy and youth,
When thought is speech and speech is truth."
Then quoting Christian in the Pilgrim's Progress: "I have given him my faith and sworn my allegiance to him. How then can I go back from this and not be hanged as a traitor?" Palmer pointed his long, bony finger at Alfred and awaited a reply. It came:
"I was indeed engaged in your dominions but your services were hard and your wages such as a man could not live on. For the wages of sin is death."
Palmer, a little discomforted, led the boy to one side, saying: "Now see here, young fellow, I'm as old as your father; I don't look it, but I am. Now you want to quit, eh? You wouldn't be at home four days before you would wish yourself back here. You are not rich, your father is not rich. You have to make a living. I'll give you an opportunity to make money. You are learning this business, you have good ideas. You remain with me, I'll make a man of you; I'll put you in a way to make more money than you've ever seen."
Alfred intimated that he could not see himself making a great deal of money at twenty dollars a month.
"Why, don't you count your board, as anything?"
"Well, I'm not satisfied. I'm worth more than twenty dollars a month to you," stubbornly contended Alfred.
"But you and your father are both bound up to me in a written agreement. Do you want to break it? Would that be right?"
"Well, you broke your written contract with the members of Rock Hill Church. You said Gideon made the contract without consulting you. Grandpap made this contract without consulting me."