The thought came: A sewing machine! that which had been her enemy to be now her friend; and the next morning I was in one of our busiest streets in front of a large establishment within whose plate-glass doors I saw a pretty lady-like young woman, busy winding thread upon one of some dozen of the ingenious little pieces of mechanism, and upon stating my wants she led me up to a bluff, sharp-looking, grey man whose face seemed to soften as she spoke before returning to her task.
“Sewing machine ma’am, eh?” he said, eyeing me very sharply. “Own use?”
“No,” I said, “I want it for a poor woman to enable her to earn her living.”
“Instalments, ma’am,” he said sharply.
“I beg your pardon.”
“Want to pay for it by instalments?” he said.
“Oh! no, I will pay for it at once, and you can deliver it to her.”
“Oh,” he said smiling, “that’s twenty per cent, discount.”
I looked at him wonderingly, for I did not know what twenty per cent discount might be.
“I always take twenty per cent discount off these machines,” he said, and I left pleasurably impressed by his ways and those of the young girl he introduced to me as his daughter, and that little new machine was the first of several in which I had Mr Smith’s kind co-operation and advice in what were doubtful cases.