Six To-Day in the Vacant Lot Corner
of Crosby and Main Streets
I began my work, and for an hour or so the vans were passing up and down the streets, and most of the women I saw left me to go and look out of their doors and windows. I could make little headway, for by two o'clock the houses were all empty. Mothers, daughters, and hired girls were on their way to the great travelling store. I went with the crowd, and found the red vans in a row on the vacant lot and many gathered about them. The sides of each van had been let down to serve as counters on which the goods were displayed. The smart-looking man who had driven the white horses sat under a little canopy of red-and-white bunting with the wonderful lady who had ridden beside him. I stood with a score of other people looking at them.
“What! do you think I would lie for a shilling?” he was saying to a man who stood beside him. “Bosh! I might tell eight lies for a dollar, but one for a shilling! No! That's below my price.”
He laid off his beaver hat and sat twisting his' sandy-hued mustache. His curly hair was cut close.
“Hey, boy!” he said, as he beckoned to me, “want to earn half a dollar?”
“Yes,” I answered.
“Well, trot down to the depot and bring me a copy of last night's Utica Observer,” he commanded, as he put a shinplaster in my hand.
When I had returned with the paper, he asked, “What ye got in yer grip?”
“Sal,” I answered.