"Look here! Look here!" she exclaimed at last, in subdued excitement. "This picture! This picture! It is you! You!" She held the book open, and looked at him in amazement. He waved her aside depreciatively, and passed outside, while she continued gazing at the picture in a state of excitement. She followed him, and they were alone.
"Why didn't you tell me this?" she cried, unable to stem her tide of excitement. She had lost interest, for the present, in all else, and pursued: "You, the author of this book!" She now saw him as another person entirely. Feeling much put out, he felt something should be resorted to, to dissipate the spell.
"I'm not the author," he said, with straight face. "Where shall we go now?" his demeanor was calm and imperious.
"Stop next door—no, that's Mrs. Brown's house," she said, as she followed him in a meditative mood. "The next house," he heard her say, as if speaking from far away. Miss Palmer was now serious, and very thoughtful.
Disturbed by her discovery, and, in a measure, disconcerted, Wyeth concentrated himself upon the demonstration of the book to a creditable degree that morning; and, one by one, with his voice and look charged with dynamite, he secured those black people's orders, and the deposit wherever they had the amount available. Miss Palmer merely followed him, insisting upon the point of authorship, until, with a touch of impatience, he admonished her that their purpose, on that occasion, was to sell the book, the author, therefore, insofar as they were concerned, was a matter of secondary consideration.
"Going to be angry with me so soon?" she pined, looking into his eyes with a feigned appeal. In spite of himself, he smiled back disconcertedly.
"You are the author, though, aren't you?" she asked softly.
He ignored the question.
"We have eleven orders, and have collected a dollar and seventy-five cents, in exactly an hour and a half," she informed him, at the end of that time. "Whether you did or did not write this book—say what you will, I'm convinced you did—you do know how to sell it. I never heard a man talk so fast and so effectively in my life!"
"I must leave you now," he said. "I have agreed to be back in town for the afternoon, and help start my young friend."