LETTER No. XIV.
A companionable deputy sheriff, a hospitable
townsman, and "the best-natured wife on
earth" inspires Pierrepont's pen to the
narration of lively incidents.
Jasper, Ind., July 21, 189—
My Dear Father:
I am surprised that my broker should have given you the particulars of my little flyer in short ribs—I mean ribs short—and in future I shall patronize another broker. The few hundreds I made in that deal I had relied upon to dispose of a little bill I owe in Chicago. When it started it wasn't quite so much like the national debt as it is now; but the fact is, I have been carting a deputy sheriff round the country for three weeks, paying for his time and board. Now you want me to return the check, endorsed to the treasurer of some orphanage. If you saw that deputy sheriff you wouldn't have the heart. If I sent you back the check it was lost in the mail and we'll forget it.
I've been so busy arranging to sell carloads of our stuff that I really haven't been able to write before, but when I got rid of that deputy a great load was removed from my mind. It's a tough thing to go in to try and sell a hard proposition a bill of goods—this is a euphemism in our case—and know that the eye of the law is glued upon the show-window, lest you escape by the back door. If I'm to keep up my present spurt in the market you'll have to raise the limit. Thirty a week might do for a drummer when you started business, but for a commercial traveller of to-day it's only tip money. I'm making good now, and if I'm not worth more than thirty I'm useless to you. I may mention in passing that I've had an offer from Soper & Co. to jump over to them. They don't know I'm your son. They know that I'm the same fellow who was at your mailing desk a while back, and probably cannot imagine that you would treat your only the way I was treated. You will agree with me that business is business and I can learn it quite as well selling car lots for Soper as for any one else. A word to the wise—and to the cashier—is sufficient.