“I suppose,” said Stewart, “that you are Branstone, but why disguise yourself as a Scottish Elder?”
“I am in my usual clothes,” said Sam, rather huffed.
“If the clothes are the man, this is no place for me. Do you often use the Bible in your business hours?”
He often did, not only to check with a quite beautiful precision the texts on his calendars by the Authorised Version, but in another way, and one which seemed to show, if it showed anything, that he looked upon the Bible with intimate familiarity. Perhaps one mascot was the vellum-bound copy of the “Social Evil” pamphlet and the other the Bible. At any rate, his price code used in the office was made up this way:
M Y F A T H E R G O D
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 20
New clerks initiated into that code used to wonder at it for a day. Then they got used to it.
“I’m correcting the proofs of this calendar,” Sam explained. “You see, it’s a shaving calendar. You hang this up by your shaving-mirror and study the text for the day while you shave.”
“I don’t,” said Stewart. “I go to the barber’s. My hand’s unsteady in the morning. But I see the idea. First read the text, then wipe your razor on it.”
“That is not the idea. See.” He pointed to the card of the calendar, and read solemnly: