"We were talking of ways of cajoling customers into paying their year's bills," said Philip. "Apparently I ought, just as a starter, to know how to coddle customer's boys, and supply hair-cutting and shaving plans to the village barber, and to play wife against husband, and learn to measure a man for clothes, like a—"
"That's so," said Caleb, "an' you can't be too quick about that, either, for Hawk'll want a new suit pretty soon."
"Anything else? By the way: what you said about the need of ready money reminds me of some questions I've been intending to ask, but forgotten. There are some mortgages in the safe on which interest will be due on the first of the year,—only a fortnight off. 'Twill aggregate nearly a thousand dollars."
"Yes,—when you get it, but interest's the slowest pay of all, in these parts, unless you work an' contrive for it. They know you won't foreclose on 'em; for while the security's good enough if you let it alone, there ain't an estate in the county that would fetch the face of its mortgage under the hammer. Besides, a merchant gen'rally dassent foreclose a mortgage, unless it's agin some worthless shack of a man. Folks remember it agin him, an' he loses some trade."
"Then those mortgages are practically worthless?"
"Oh, no. The money's in 'em, principal an' int'rest in full,—but the holder's got to know how to git it out. That's the difference between successful merchants and failures."
"H'm—I see. Apparently country merchants should be, like the disciples, as wise as serpents and as harmless as doves."
"That's it in a nutshell. I reckon any fool could make money in the store business if there was nothin' to do but weigh an' measure out goods an' take in ready cash for 'em. But there ain't no ready money in this county, 'xcept what the merchants get in for the produce they send out. There ain't no banks, so the store-keepers have to be money-lenders, an' have money in hand to lend; for while there's some borrowers that can be turned off, there's some it would never do to say 'No' to, if you wanted further dealin's with 'em, for they'd feel as if they'd lost their main dependence, an' been insulted besides. Why, some of our customers come in here Saturdays an' get a few five an' ten cent pieces, on credit like any other goods, so's their families can have somethin' to put in the plate in church on Sunday."
"But there are rentals due from several farms, and from houses in town. Are they as hard to collect as interest on mortgages?"