The avalanche started the next morning. Before we opened the store there was a line of youngsters outside, each carrying from one to six catalogs. Great big fellows, they were, many of them.
As they came into the store, we passed out coupons, each one numbered separately. A boy bringing in two catalogs got two coupons, and so on. All the week we had catalogs rolling in. Some of them were ten years old. I didn't know there were so many mail-order houses. By the looks of many of the catalogs they had been frequently used.
One funny incident occurred. Mrs. Robinson, whom everybody swore was the original woman with the serpent's tongue—she could never see good in anything or anybody—came into the store in high indignation, saying that her little boy, Wallace, had, without her permission, collected her four mail-order catalogs and had turned them into the store for coupons, and she demanded that I give the catalogs back.
I explained to her that I didn't know which catalogs were hers. She replied that I had catalogs from all the mail-order concerns, and I must give her one of this and one of that and one of another, or otherwise she would make trouble for me!
I had had so many people talking big to me lately that I was getting up a fighting spirit. I turned around to her and said:
"I'm sorry I can't comply with your request. If you have anything else to say, please say it. If not, good-by!"
Gee whiz! what that woman did say! Anyway, she left the store after a while, and didn't get her catalogs. She had never spent a penny with me, and never would. She was a relation of Stigler's, and I had a "hunch" that he had put her up to it.
Stigler had been telling all around town that I was afraid of mail-order competition because my prices were higher, and that that was why I was collecting the catalogs. He said he didn't care how many catalogs people had, he could hold his own with competition.
I met Barlow one lunch time and he came over and put his hand on my shoulder, saying:
"You put the cat among the pigeons this time, didn't you?"