“My daughter Sally——” began the old man.
“Same thing,” said Wilkins; “you pay just the same if you bought the books. Why, Sammy, there's enough Sir Walter right here in Kilo now to start up a book business. Kilo's light on literatoor generally, but when she goes in, she goes in heavy. There ain't many towns where you'll find every livin' soul ready to swaller down fifteen dollars worth of Sir Walter Scott, two dollars down and one dollar a month until paid; but I calculate them ten volumes will last Kilo quite a spell, and if worst comes to worst she won't buy no more literatoor till she gits paid up on Sir Walter. I figger from my own sense of feelin's that about the worst time to sell a feller books is when he is still payin' once a month on the old lot. About the second time the collector drops in to collect on a set of works of literatoor, a man feels like he had been foolish, but he grins cheerful, and pays up, but if another man drops in about then to sell another set of the world's great masterpieces it is pretty near an insult to human intelligence.”
Eliph' Hewlitt drew his hand across his whiskers and coughed gently.
“They told me in Jefferson,” he said softly, “that Kilo was the most intellectual town in central Iowa.”
“Everybody says the same,” said Wilkins with a touch of pride. “The Sir Walter Scott man said it, and I guess it's so. But there's other things besides books. Kilo may be strong and willin' on books, but she's strong other ways, too, and just now she is lookin' at another kind of horse, and that's why I say you've miscalculated your comin'. If I was you I'd go elsewhere and come back later. Kilo has got more books now than she can handle without straining something, and just now her mind's off on another tack. We struck a big missionary revival here last week, and you can bet a wager that every dollar that goes out of Kilo these days, except what goes for dues on Sir Walter, is goin' for the brethren. The women folks is havin' a sale this very evenin' to raise cash to help the heathen.”
Eliph' Hewlitt arose from his chair and tucked the oilcloth-covered parcel that had been lying on his knees under his left arm. He was a small man, and his movements were apt to be short and jerky.
“Missionary sale?” he said briskly. “I guess I'll go around and look in on it. Strangers welcome, I suppose? I'm rather fond of missionary sales, and I think the world and all of the heathen. Think the ladies would like to see a stranger?”
Wilkins grinned.
“Pap,” he said, “what you think? Think they'll fall on his neck if he has any money? From what I have experienced of them sales I figger to calculate that anybody that is anxious to buy gingham aprons an' sofa pillows is sure to be took by the hand and given a front seat. I'd go around with you, but I've got my taxes to pay, like Pap here, and I don't actually need any pink tidies. It ain't far; just up to Doc Weaver's; two blocks up, and you can't miss the house. It's the yeller mansion, this side the road, an' the gate's off the hinges and laid up alongside the fence. But I guess if them's your samples in that there package, you might as well leave them here.”
But Eliph' Hewlitt did not leave them there; he tucked them under his arm, and hurried away with brisk little steps.