“He’ll get no ninety-cent cucumbers from me.”
“That’s the spirit, Mrs. O’Mally. We’ve got to fight him. It’s our duty, sort of. For if we can work this pickle scheme, independent of him, the sweet-corn farmers can then get together, in pattern of us, and beat him at that game, too. It will mean thousands of dollars to them. And instead of mortgaging their farms to buy shoes and stockings, they’ll be able to ride around in Chevrolets.”
Mrs. O’Mally liked the idea of the Chevrolets.
“But what women have ye in mind?” she let down the bars.
“Jerry’s ma will help, for one.”
“Sure thing,” I swung in. “And she probably can get some of the Methodist ladies, too.”
Poppy almost jumped over the table.
“Hot dog!” he yipped. “Now I know! There isn’t a church in town that isn’t head over heels in debt. All these bazaars that are put on by the different church societies, and the chicken-pie suppers, is just an endless run of schemes to raise money. All right! If the church ladies want to raise money, we’ll put them to work. We furnish everything and they get ten per cent of what the pickles sell for. Why, kid,” he yipped it off, from the peak of his enthusiasm, “they’ll jump at a scheme like that. Sure thing. And if we find out that we have more cucumbers than the Methodist ladies can handle, we’ll give the Presbyterian ladies a chance to lift their church debt. If that isn’t enough, we’ll call in the Catholic ladies. For pickles are pickles, kid, regardless of whether they’re Protestant pickles or Catholic pickles.”
Mrs. O’Mally got the idea from this talk that the church ladies were going to run things to suit themselves.
“Sure,” she heaved a sigh of relief, “’tis glad I am to learn that ye hain’t a-goin’ to need me.”