He had eaten nothing since Saturday noon, excepting the sandwiches, and he felt that he should not be good for much until after he had had breakfast. His mind was full of unpleasant memories of the stores and offices he had entered during his last week's hunt, and he did not relish2 renewing it.
"I must go ahead though," he thought. "Something must be done, or I'll starve."
Every moment Jack felt better, and he arose from the table a little more like himself.
"Ten cents left," he said, as he went out into the street. "That'll buy me one more bowl of bread and milk. What shall I do then?"
"Ten cents left."
"Ten cents left."
It was a serious question, and demanded attention. It was still very early for the city, but stores were beginning to open, and groups of men were hurrying along the sidewalks on their way to business. Jack went on, thinking and thinking, and a fit of depression was upon him when he entered a street turning out from Broadway. He had not tried this street before. It was not wide, and it was beginning to look busy. At the end of two blocks, Jack uttered an exclamation3:
"That's queer!" he said. "They all sell coffee, tea, groceries, and that sort of thing. Big stores, too. I'll try here."
His heart sank a little, as he paused in front of a very bustling4 establishment, bearing every appearance of prosperity. Some men were bringing out tea-chests and bags of coffee to pile around the doorway5, as if to ask passers-by to walk in and buy some. The show-windows were already filled with samples of sugar, coffee, and a dozen other kinds of goods. Just beyond one window Jack could see the first of a row of three huge coffee-grinders painted red, and back of the other window was more machinery6.
"I'll go in, anyway," he said, setting his teeth. "Only ten cents left!"
That small coin, because it was all alone in his pocket, drove him into the door. Two thirds down the broad store there stood a black-eyed, wiry, busy-looking man, giving various directions to the clerks and other men. Jack thought, "He's the 'boss.' He looks as if he'd say no, right away."
Although Jack's heart was beating fast, he walked boldly up to this man:
"Mister," he said, "do you want to hire another boy?"
"You are the hundred and eleventh boy who has asked that same question within a week. No," responded the black-eyed man, sharply but good naturedly.
"Gifford," came at that moment from a very cheerful voice over Jack's left shoulder, "I've cleaned out that lot of potatoes. Sold two thousand barrels on my way down, at a dollar and a half a barrel."
Jack remembered that some uncommonly7 heavy footsteps had followed him when he came in, and found that he had to look upward to see the face of the speaker, who was unusually tall. The man leaned forward, too, so that Jack's face was almost under his.
Mr. Gifford's answer had disappointed Jack and irritated him.
"You did well!" said Mr. Gifford.
Before he had time to think Jack said:
"A dollar and a half? Well, if you knew anything about potatoes, you wouldn't have let them go for a dollar and a half a barrel!"
"What do you know about potatoes?" growled9 the tall man, leaning an inch lower, and frowning at Jack's interruption.
"More than you or Mr. Gifford seems to," said Jack desperately10. "The crop's going to be short. I know how it is up our way."
"Tell us what you know!" said the tall man sharply; and Mr. Gifford drew nearer with an expression of keen interest upon his face.
"They're all poor," said Jack, and then he remembered and repeated, better than he could have done if he had made ready beforehand, all he had heard the two men say in the Hotel Dantzic reading-room, and all he had heard in Crofield and Mertonville. He had heard the two men call each other by name, and he ended with:
"Didn't you sell your lot to Murphy & Scales? They're buying everywhere."
"That's just what I did," said the tall man. "I wish I hadn't; I'll go right out and buy!" and away he went.
"Buy some on my account," said Mr. Gifford, as the other man left the store. "See here, my boy, I don't want to hire anybody. But you seem to know about potatoes. Probably you're just from a farm. What else do you know? What can you do?"
"A good many things," said Jack, and to his own astonishment11 he spoke12 out clearly and confidently.
"Oh, you can?" laughed Mr. Gifford. "Well, I don't need you, but I need an engineer. I wish you knew enough to run a small steam-engine."
"Why, I can run a steam-engine," said Jack. "That's nothing. May I see it?"
Mr. Gifford pointed8 at some machinery behind the counter, near where he stood, and at the apparatus13 in the show-window.
"It's a little one that runs the coffee-mills and the printing-press," he said. "You can't do anything with it until a machinist mends it—it's all out of order, I'm told."
"Perhaps I can," said Jack. "A boy who's learned the blacksmith's trade ought to be able to put it to rights."
Without another word, Jack went to work.
"Nothing wrong here, Mr. Gifford," he said in a minute. "Where are the screw-driver, and the monkey-wrench, and an oil-can?"
"Well, well!" exclaimed Mr. Gifford, as he sent a man for the tools. "Do you think you can do it?"
Jack said nothing aloud, but he told himself:
"Why, it's a smaller size but like the one in the Eagle office. They get out of order easily, but then it's easy to regulate them."
"You do know something," said Mr. Gifford, laughing, a few minutes later, when Jack said to him:
"She'll do now."
"She won't do very well," added Mr. Gifford, shaking his head. "That engine never was exactly the thing. It lacks power."
"It may be the pulley-belt's too loose," said Jack, after studying the mechanism14 for a moment.
"I'll send for a man to fix it, then."
"No, you needn't," said Jack. "I can tighten15 it so she'll run all the machinery you have. May I have an awl16?"
"Of course," said Mr. Gifford. "Put it to rights. There's plenty of coffee waiting to be ground."
Jack went to work at the loose belt.
"He's a bright fellow," said Mr. Gifford to his head-clerk. "If we wanted another boy—but we don't."
"Too many now," was the short, decisive reply.
It was not long before the machinery began to move.
"Good!" said Mr. Gifford. "I almost wish I had something more for you to do, but I really haven't. If you could run that good-for-nothing old printing-press—"
"Printing-press?" exclaimed Jack.
"Over in the other window," said Mr. Gifford. "We thought of printing all our own circulars, cards, and paper bags. But it's a failure, unless we should hire a regular printer. We shall have to, I suppose. If you were a printer, now."
"I've worked at a press," said Jack. "I'm something of a printer. I'm sure I can do that work. It's like a press I used to run when I worked in that business."
Jack at once went to the show-window.
"An 'Alligator17' press," he said, "like the one in the Standard office. It ought to be oiled, though. It needs adjusting, too. No wonder it would not work. I can make it go."
The business of the store was beginning. Steam was up in the engine, and the coffee-mills were grinding merrily. Mr. Gifford and all his clerks were busied with other matters, and Jack was left to tinker away at the Alligator press. "She's ready to run. I'll start her," he said at last.
He took an impression of the form of type that was in the press and read it.
"I see," he said. "They print that on their paper bags for an advertisement. I'll show it to Mr. Gifford. There are plenty of blank ones lying around here, all ready to print."
He walked up to the desk and handed in the proof, asking:
"Is that all right?"
"No," said Mr. Gifford. "We let our stock of bags run down because the name of the firm was changed. I want to add several things. I'll send for somebody to have the proof corrections made."
"You needn't," said Jack. "Tell me what you want. Any boy who's ever worked in a newspaper office can do a little thing like that."
"How do you come to know so much about machinery?" asked Mr. Gifford, trying not to laugh.
"Oh," said Jack, "I was brought up a blacksmith, but I've worked at other trades, and it was easy enough to adjust those things."
"That's what you've been up to is it?" said Mr. Gifford. "I saw you hammering and filing, and I wondered what you'd accomplished18. I want the new paper bags to be,"—and he told Jack what changes were required, and added:
"Then, of course, I shall need some circulars—three kinds—and some cards."
"That press will run over a thousand an hour when it's geared right. You'll see," said Jack, positively19.
"Well, here's a true Jack-at-all-trades!" exclaimed Mr. Gifford, opening his eyes. "I begin to wish we had a place for you!"
It was nearly noon before Jack had another sample of printing ready to show. There was a good supply of type, to be sure, but he was not much of a printer, and type-setting did not come easily to him. He worked almost desperately, however, and meanwhile his brains were as busy as the coffee-mills. He succeeded finally, and it was time, for a salesman was just reporting:
"Mr. Gifford, we're out of paper bags."
"We must have some right away," said Mr. Gifford. "I wish that youngster really knew how to print them. He's tinkering at it over there."
"Is that right?" asked Jack only a second later, holding out a printed bag.
"Why, yes, that's the thing. Go ahead," said the surprised coffee-dealer. "I thought you'd failed this time."
"I'll run off a lot," said Jack, "and then I'll go out and get something to eat."
"No, you won't," said Mr. Gifford promptly20. "No going out, during business hours, in this house. I'll have a luncheon21 brought to you. I'll try you to-day, anyhow."
Back went Jack without another word, but he thought silently, "That saves me ten cents."
The Alligator press was started, and Jack fed it with the blank paper bags the salesmen needed, and he began to feel happy. He was even happier when his luncheon was brought; for the firm of Gifford & Company saw that their employees fared well.
"I declare!" said Jack to himself, "it's the first full meal I've had since last week Wednesday! I was starved."
On went the press, and the young pressman sat doggedly22 at his task; but he was all the while watching things in the store and hearing whatever there was to hear.
"I know their prices pretty well," he thought. "Most of the things are marked—ever so much lower than Crofield prices, too."
He had piles of printed bags of different sizes ready for use, now lying around him.
"Time to get at some of those circulars," he was saying, as he arose from his seat at the press and stepped out behind the counter.
"Five pounds of coffee," said a lady, before the counter, in a tone of vexation. "I've waited long enough. Mocha and Java, mixed."
"Thirty-five cents," said Jack.
"Quick, then," said she, and he darted23 away to fill her order.
"Three and a half pounds of powdered sugar," said another lady, as he passed her.
"Yes, ma'am," said Jack.
"How much is this soap?" asked a stout24 old woman, and Jack remembered that price too.
He was not at all aware that anybody was watching him; but he was just telling another customer about tea and baking-soda when he felt a hand upon his shoulder.
"See here," demanded Mr. Gifford, "what are you doing behind the counter?"
"I was afraid they'd get tired of waiting and go somewhere else," said Jack. "I know something about waiting on customers. Yes, ma'am, that's a fine tea. Forty-eight cents. Half pound? Yes ma'am. In a jiffy, Mr. Gifford;—there are bags enough for to-day."
"I think you may stay," said the head of the house. "I didn't need another boy; but I begin to think I do need a blacksmith, a carpenter, a printer, and a good sharp salesman." As he was turning away he added, "It's surprising how quickly he has picked up our prices."
Jack's fingers were trembling nervously25, but his face brightened as he did up that package.
Mr. Gifford waited while the Crofield boy answered yet another customer and sold some coffee, and told Jack to go right on.
"Come to the desk," he then said. "I don't even know your name. Come."
Very hot and yet a little shaky was Jack as he followed; but Mr. Gifford was not a verbose26 man.
"Mr. Jones," he said to the head clerk, "please take down his name;—what is it?"
"John Ogden, sir," and after other questions and answers, Mr. Gifford said:
"Find a cheaper boarding-place. You can get good board for five dollars a week. Your pay is only ten dollars a week to begin, and you must live on that. We'll see that you earn it, too. You can begin printing circulars and cards."
Jack went, and Mr. Gifford added:
"Why, Mr. Jones, he's saved sending for three different workmen since he came in. He'll make a good salesman, too. He's a boy—but he isn't only a boy. I'll keep him."
Jack went to the press as if in a dream.
"A place!" he said to himself. "Well, yes. I've got a place. Good wages, too; but I suppose they won't pay until Saturday night. How am I to keep going until then? I have to pay my bill at the Hotel Dantzic, too—now I've begun on a new week. I'll go without my supper, and buy a sandwich in the morning, and then—I'll get along somehow."
He worked all that afternoon with an uneasy feeling that he was being watched. The paper bags were finished, a fair supply of them; and then the type for the circular needed only a few changes, and he began on that. Each new job made him remember things he had learned in the Standard office, or had gathered from Mr. Black, the wooden foreman of the Eagle. It was just as well, however, that things needed only fixing up and not setting anew, for that might have been a little beyond him. As it was, he overcame all difficulties, besides leaving the press three times to act as salesman.
Gifford & Co. kept open to accommodate customers who purchased goods on their way home; and it was after nearly all other business houses, excepting such as theirs, were closed, that the very tall man leaned in at the door and then came striding down the store to the desk.
"Gifford," he said, "that clerk of yours was right. There's almost a panic in potatoes. I've got five thousand barrels for you, and five thousand for myself, at a dollar and sixty, and the price just jumped. They will bring two dollars. If they do, we'll make two thousand apiece."
"I'm glad you did so well," said Mr. Gifford dryly, "but don't say much to him about it. Let him alone—"
"Well, yes;—but I want to do something for him. Give him this ten dollar bill from me."
"Very well," said Mr. Gifford, "you owe the profit to him. I'll take care of my side of the matter. Ogden, come here a moment!"
Jack stopped the press and came to the desk. The money was handed to him.
"It's just a bit of luck," said the tall man; "but your information was valuable to me."
"Thank you," said Jack, after he had in vain refused the money.
"You've done enough," said Mr. Gifford; "this will do for your first day. Eight o'clock in the morning, remember. Good-night!"
"I'm glad I belong here," Jack said to himself. "If I'd had my pick of the city I would have chosen this very store. Ten dollars! I can pay Mr. Keifelheimer now, and I sha'n't have to starve to death."
Jack felt so prosperous that he walked only to the nearest station of the elevated railway, and cheerfully paid five cents for a ride up-town.
When the Hotel Dantzic was reached, it seemed a much more cheerful and home-like building than it had appeared when he left it in the morning; and Jack had now no notion of dodging28 Mr. Keifelheimer. There he stood on the doorstep, looking stern and dignified29. He was almost too polite when Jack said:
"Good-evening, Mr. Keifelheimer."
"Goot-efening," he replied, with a bow. "I hope you gets along vell mit your beezness?"
"Pretty well," said Jack cheerfully.
"Vere vas you feexed?" asked Mr. Keifelheimer, doubtfully.
Jack held out one of the business cards of Gifford & Company, and replied:
"That's where I am. I guess I'll pay for my room here till the end of this week, and then I'll find a place farther down town."
"I vas so sorry dey peek30 your pocket," said Mr. Keifelheimer, looking at the card. "Tell you vat27, Mr. Ogden, you take supper mit me. It cost you not'ing. I haf to talk some mit you."
Jack dines with Mr. Keifelheimer.
Jack dines with Mr. Keifelheimer.
"All right," said Jack. "I'll pay up at the desk, and then I'll get ready for dinner."
When he came down Mr. Keifelheimer was waiting for him, very smiling, but not nearly so polite and dignified. Hardly were they seated at the supper-table, before the proprietor31 coughed twice affectedly32, and then remarked:
"You not leaf de Hotel Dantzic, Mr. Ogden. I use up pounds and boxes of tea und sugar und coffee, und all dose sometings dey sell at Gifford und Company's. You get me de best prices mit dem, und you safe me a great heap of money. I get schwindled, schwindled, all de times! You vas keep your room, und you pays for vat you eats. De room is a goot room, but it shall cost you not vun cent. So? If I find you safe me money, I go on mit you."
"I'll do my best," said Jack. "Let me know what you're paying now."
"Ve go all ofer de leest after ve eat someting," said Mr. Keifelheimer. "Mr. Guilderaufenberg say goot deal about you. So did de ladies. I vas sorry dot dey peek your pocket."
Probably he had now forgotten just what he had thought of saying to Jack in case the boy had not been able to pay for his room, and had been out of employment; but Jack was enjoying a fine illustration of that wise proverb which says: "Nothing succeeds like success."
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1
jack
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| n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克 | |
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2
relish
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| n.滋味，享受，爱好，调味品；vt.加调味料，享受，品味；vi.有滋味 | |
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3
exclamation
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| n.感叹号，惊呼，惊叹词 | |
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4
bustling
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| adj.喧闹的 | |
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5
doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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6
machinery
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| n.(总称)机械，机器；机构 | |
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7
uncommonly
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| adv. 稀罕(极，非常) | |
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8
pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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9
growled
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| v.（动物）发狺狺声， （雷）作隆隆声( growl的过去式和过去分词 )；低声咆哮着说 | |
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10
desperately
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| adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地 | |
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11
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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12
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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13
apparatus
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| n.装置，器械；器具，设备 | |
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14
mechanism
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| n.机械装置；机构，结构 | |
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15
tighten
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| v.(使)变紧；(使)绷紧 | |
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16
awl
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| n.尖钻 | |
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17
alligator
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| n.短吻鳄(一种鳄鱼) | |
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18
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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19
positively
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| adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实 | |
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20
promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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21
luncheon
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| n.午宴，午餐，便宴 | |
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22
doggedly
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| adv.顽强地，固执地 | |
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23
darted
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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25
nervously
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| adv.神情激动地，不安地 | |
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26
verbose
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| adj.用字多的；冗长的；累赘的 | |
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27
vat
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| n.(=value added tax)增值税，大桶 | |
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28
dodging
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| n.避开，闪过，音调改变v.闪躲( dodge的现在分词 )；回避 | |
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29
dignified
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| a.可敬的，高贵的 | |
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30
peek
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| vi.偷看，窥视；n.偷偷的一看，一瞥 | |
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31
proprietor
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| n.所有人；业主；经营者 | |
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32
affectedly
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