to me about
his ability to pay the rent--I found that out just after we signed up.
And then another fellow comes along with a better offer for the house,
and I felt it was my duty to the firm to get rid of Varney, and I was
so worried about it I skun up there and got back the lease. Honest, Mr.
Babbitt, I didn't intend to pull anything crooked. I just wanted the
firm to have all the commis--"

"Wait now, Stan. This may all be true, but I've been having a lot of
complaints about you. Now I don't s'pose you ever mean to do wrong,
and I think if you just get a good lesson that'll jog you up a little,
you'll turn out a first-class realtor yet. But I don't see how I can
keep you on."

Graff leaned against the filing-cabinet, his hands in his pockets, and
laughed. "So I'm fired! Well, old Vision and Ethics, I'm tickled
to death! But I don't want you to think you can get away with any
holier-than-thou stuff. Sure I've pulled some raw stuff--a little of
it--but how could I help it, in this office?"

"Now, by God, young man--"

"Tut, tut! Keep the naughty temper down, and don't holler, because
everybody in the outside office will hear you. They're probably
listening right now. Babbitt, old dear, you're crooked in the first
place and a damn skinflint in the second. If you paid me a decent salary
I wouldn't have to steal pennies off a blind man to keep my wife from
starving. Us married just five months, and her the nicest girl living,
and you keeping us flat broke all the time, you damned old thief, so you
can put money away for your saphead of a son and your wishywashy fool
of a daughter! Wait, now! You'll by God take it, or I'll bellow so the
whole office will hear it! And crooked--Say, if I told the prosecuting
attorney what I know about this last Street Traction option steal, both
you and me would go to jail, along with some nice, clean, pious, high-up
traction guns!"

"Well, Stan, looks like we were coming down to cases. That deal--There
was nothing crooked about it. The only way you can get progress is for
the broad-gauged men to get things done; and they got to be rewarded--"

"Oh, for Pete's sake, don't get virtuous on me! As I gather it, I'm
fired. All right. It's a good thing for me. And if I catch you knocking
me to any other firm, I'll squeal all I know about you and Henry T. and
the dirty little lickspittle deals that you corporals of industry pull
off for the bigger and brainier crooks, and you'll get chased o