"But what would we have to sell? I thought at a fire sale you had to sell stuff that got damaged by the fire."
There was more wisdom in that remark than he knew.
Jones replied: "Everybody in town knows we've had a fire; but they don't know how bad it was, and we can put in the sale a lot of old stuff we want to get rid of, and get away with it, all right."
"Hum," remarked Larsen. "That would be a fake, wouldn't it?"
Here I broke in. "It's a good suggestion, Jones but I don't think we want to have a fire sale. We had no stuff damaged, to speak of, and it would, as Larsen says, be a fake sale, if we had one; and I believe we'll win out in the end by saying and doing nothing that is going to be other than the truth."
Jones was inclined to be sulky at this, and my first impulse was to speak to him sharply; but I remembered, fortunately in time, my previous lesson never to talk to an employee angrily, and furthermore, that this was a directors' meeting, where each was privileged to say what he wished without regard for position. I realized that Jones had made the suggestion in all sincerity, thinking it was to my interest, so I said:
"You know, Jones, that I have made several suggestions that we decided not to adopt, for no one of us knows all the best of it. In some ways that's a good suggestion of yours, and, if we'd had a little more stuff damaged to justify it, I think I'd have been very much tempted to have a fire sale. But, as it is, don't you think we had better exert ourselves in making a big push on perfect Christmas goods, rather than emphasizing damaged goods? You see, if we had a fire sale, some people might hesitate about buying from us for a little while, even after the sale, thinking that we would be trying to sell them fire-damaged goods."
"Well, won't they think that now?" he asked, somewhat mollified.
"By Jove, perhaps they will," I returned. "How would you suggest overcoming that?"
Larsen was about to speak, but I checked him. I wanted to have Jones feeling good-natured again.