tart with! I can help save the lives of a few children.
That's all! I'll be following my new motto. Will you give me the job?"

"I sure will," declared Nowell, heartily. "If I don't know when a man is
talking rock-bottom to me, then it's my own fault. When do you want to
go to work?"

"Now."

Nowell gave the new man's garments a disparaging side glance.

"You look more as if you was going out to preach instead of deliver ice.
But I can fix that if you're busted, my friend. You slip off that
coat and help here till we're loaded. Then ride into the city on the
freight-car and tell any one of my men to give you the overalls and
jumper I left hanging in my stable office."

In this fashion it came about that Farr that day was riding on an
ice-wagon in Marion, learning his route. A red-headed youth who was
nursing an ice-pick wound in a bundled-up foot served as guide and
driver and spotted the "Crystal Pure" cards propped here and there in
windows, mutely signaling the household needs. With zestful complacency,
and with secret enjoyment in being allowed to "team" this chap who
looked and talked like a "nob," the youth allowed Farr to do all the
work.

The route took in many apartment-houses of the city.

The labor was muscle-racking. In most cases there were stairs to climb.
He stood, sagging under his burden, till chests were cleared by
the housewives or sluggish maids. He discovered that the iceman was
considered a fair and logical butt for all the forenoon grouches of the
kitchen. Women complained querulously that the ice dripped on the clean
floor, or that the piece was not up to the twenty-cent piece delivered
by the other company, or that he was late, or he had not had his eyes
about him the day before or else he would have seen the card.

On numerous occasions he was obliged to carry a piece of ice back
down-stairs to his cart and exchange it for a piece of another size and
price. He received no apology in such cases; he was tartly informed that
he ought to have common sense enough to know what was wanted in that
house. In other cases, the mistress of the apartments turned him from
the door and explained with entire lack of interest in his long climb
that the card had been left up by oversight--the chest had been filled
the day before.

And at two places sharp-tongued women would not allow him to enter,
frankly stating that icemen were too dirty creatures to allow inside the
door of a respectable house; the