"I'm going to put it in jest as many different banks as I can. See? Fifty 'ere, fifty there. 'Posit. I'm not going to 'nvest it—no fear."
"It's only frowing money away," said Ann.
"I'm 'arf a mind to bury some of it under the shop. Only I expect one 'ud always be coming down at nights to make sure it was there.... I don't seem to trust anyone—not with money." He put the cheque on the table corner and smiled and tapped his pipe on the grate with his eyes on that wonderful document. "S'pose old Bean started orf," he reflected.... "One thing, 'e is a bit lame."
"'E wouldn't," said Ann; "not 'im."
"I was only joking like." He stood up, put his pipe among the candlesticks on the mantel, took up the cheque and began folding it carefully to put it back in his pocket-book.
A little bell jangled.
"Shop!" said Kipps. "That's right. Keep a shop and the shop'll keep you. That's 'ow I look at it, Ann."
He drove his pocket-book securely into his breast pocket before he opened the living-room door....
But whether indeed it is the bookshop that keeps Kipps or whether it is Kipps who keeps the bookshop is just one of those commercial mysteries people of my unarithmetical temperament are never able to solve. They do very well, the dears, anyhow, thank Heaven!
The bookshop of Kipps is on the left-hand side of the Hythe High Street coming from Folkestone, between the yard of the livery stable and the shop-window full of old silver and such like things—it is quite easy to find—and there you may see him for yourself and speak to him and buy this book of him if you like. He has it in stock, I know. Very delicately I've seen to that. His name is not Kipps, of course, you must understand that, but everything else is exactly as I have told you. You can talk to him about books, about politics, about going to Boulogne, about life, and the ups and downs of life. Perhaps he will quote you Buggins—from whom, by the bye, one can now buy everything a gentleman's wardrobe should contain at the little shop in Rendezvous Street, Folkestone. If you are fortunate to find Kipps in a good mood he may even let you know how he inherited a fortune "once." "Run froo it," he'll say with a not unhappy smile. "Got another afterwards—speckylating in plays. Needn't keep this shop if I didn't like. But it's something to do."...