“Well, when you do want a job come around to see me.”
“He’s mine,” says Spillane. “Keep off.”
“Tell you what I’ll do,” says the fat man. “You write me a letter so I get it every Saturday, telling me everything that goes on and what schemes you work, and—you can have any reasonable credit you want. You won’t be pushed, either.”
Marked thanked him and then Spillane hauled us off in a hurry. Mark tried to thank him when we were outside, but he only growled at us, so it wasn’t possible. From The Wolverine Novelties Company he took us to every other wholesaler we did business with, and to the sheet-music people, where he fixed it so Skip couldn’t take away our agency. He fixed everybody. Then he went back to the office and dictated letters to the phonograph company and other folks whose goods we were handling—folks in New York and Chicago and Cincinnati, and they were real bang-up letters, too. When he got through there wasn’t a thing for us to worry about on the score of credit. Then he took us to dinner at a big hotel and drove us to the train.
We got back to Wicksville toward evening, tired, but pretty average well satisfied with things in general, I can tell you. The Bazar was closed, of course, so we went right home.
“Wish I could see Jehoshaphat P. Skip’s face when he hears about it,” says I.
“He’s goin’ to hear about somethin’ he’ll like worse,” says Mark, in the way he talks when he’s done something big but isn’t ready to tell about it.
“What’s up?” says I.
“You’ll find out pretty soon,” says he. “It’ll m-make Mr. Skip swaller his false teeth.”