After a moment Willard asked: “Who would he be?”
“Me. I’ll tell you. I’ve got a little money saved up. Been putting it away for two years. I used to think that when I had enough I’d go somewhere and start a repair shop; perhaps in Providence. Lately, though, I’ve sort of changed my mind about that. There’s been so many of them started up this last year that I guess the business is kind of overdone. I’ve got about seven hundred dollars put away. Now, suppose I put that into your business, fellows, and we buy a good truck and start in right? We’d have to have another driver, I suppose; anyway, we would while you fellows were at school; but I guess we could afford him. Of course I wouldn’t be getting as much as I get now; not for a while; but I’d be working for myself, don’t you see? Besides, after a while we ought to have a mighty good business. I tell you, fellows, the motor has come to stay, and there’s no end to what we might do. There are more cars coming into town every month; two new ones came the other day; and we might sell gasoline and do repairs and deal in tires. We’d ought to have a place for our own cars, anyway, and why couldn’t we take others, too? There’s big money in the garage business! And as for selling supplies, why, say, you can make a hundred per cent. on some things!”
Willard’s surprise had turned to enthusiasm. Tom, more cautious, was thinking hard. It was Tom who answered.
“Say we make two hundred a month, though, Jimmy. That isn’t much when you divide it in three parts; I mean after you’ve paid expenses!”
“Two hundred!” jeered Jimmy. “We can make four hundred! We can make five hundred when we get the garage going! Now, look here. Say we hire a shed or an old stable somewhere near the center of town. We keep our own cars in there and we have tools for making our own repairs and we have a good big storage tank filled with gasoline for our own use and we have barrels of oil and grease. We wouldn’t have to pay much rent for a building like that. Say twenty a month. Now suppose we look after some more cars. We’ve got the space and what we get for storage is clear profit, don’t you see? Then if the cars have to be washed and polished we get seventy-five cents or a dollar for it. When we sell the owners a gallon of gasoline we make, say, three cents. When we sell ’em cylinder oil or grease we make anywhere from twenty to fifty per cent. Then why couldn’t we keep tires? And all the other things you need? Say, there’s big money in it, fellows!”
“We’d have to have men to do the work, though,” objected Tom, trying to keep his enthusiasm down.
“Sure we would! We’d have to have a washer and a man to run one of the cars, and maybe we’d have to have a repair man to help me. But we wouldn’t get them unless we had the business, Tom.”
“N-no.”
“I wish I wasn’t going to college—almost!” sighed Willard.
“Well, you fellows think it over,” said Jimmy. “It looks to me like a good thing for all of us, but you’d better consult your folks and talk it over. I don’t want to butt in on you unless you want me, but I’ve had some experience in the business, fellows, and I think you need a chap around that has had experience. But you fellows take your time and do as you like.”