Just then a tall gentleman came along the hall and looked at Mark, and sort of grinned when he heard what Mark said. He stopped and says, “What seems to be the main difficulty here?”
“We came to see the m-m-man that owns this factory—on m-mighty important business—and this kid spoke a piece he didn’t seem to know very well,” says Mark.
The man coughed into his hand and says: “I own the mill, young man. What’s your important business?”
“Money,” says Mark.
“That’s always important,” says the man.
“You bet,” says Mark. “So we come to git some. You owe us f-f-for ’most a car of chair-s-spindles shipped a week ago, and if you had any idea how much we need that money I’ll bet you’d send it by telegraph. Honest, I dunno’s anybody ever needed money as bad as we need that.”
“Who are you, anyhow?”
“I’m Mark Tidd and this is Plunk Smalley. We’re from Wicksville and we’re runnin’ Silas Doolittle Bugg’s mill. He got it all messed up and we s-s-stepped in to straighten him out.”
“Silas Bugg, eh?” says the man. “And you stepped in to straighten him out? Mill experts, are you?”
“We hain’t much of any experts,” says Mark, “but when it comes to business, anythin’ would be an improvement over Silas. We calc’late to pull him through.”