In another fifteen minutes they were there—a dozen of them. Mark stood up and says:
“I want you f-f-folks to buy Mason jars—from Jehoshaphat P. Skip. He’s sellin’ ’em for less than we can buy them for. D-don’t b’lieve he’s got many dozen.”
“What’s the idee?” says Uncle Ike.
“We got a sale on,” says Mark. “Th-three jars for a dime. This man Skip—just to bust up our sale—goes and advertises f-four jars for a dime. What we got to do is buy every last jar he’s got—quick! We got to buy ’em before Wicksville folks start buyin’. When they come to buy from the Five-and-Ten-Cent Store there mustn’t be any there to b-b-buy.”
Uncle Ike slapped his leg. “Smartest kid I ever see,” says he to himself. “Greased lightenin’s slow. Folks, I’ve been drivin’ a ’bus a good many years, and you git to know a lot on a ’bus. Grand eddication. But never in all them years have I seen the beat of this here Mark Tidd. No, sir. He tops the pile.”
Everybody was willing to help us out, so Mark gave them money out of the till and they straggled off to the Five-and-Ten-Cent Store. Each one was to buy all he could.
Uncle Ike came first with two dozen, and Binney’s dad brought two dozen—seems that’s all Skip would sell to one person. Then the rest straggled in with two dozen apiece till it came to Chet Weevil.
“Only got half a dozen,” says he, grinning all over. “The last half-dozen there was. We’ve cleaned him out. Every last can’s bought.”
Then Mark grinned—and said thank you to everybody and told us to get to our places, for the sale was going to start. He went back to paint a new sign. It said:
WHEN YOU COME BACK FROM