meanings. I never want to be responsible for
its second meaning in connection with this concern."

"You never will be, T. A."

"Not with you at the helm." He smiled rather sadly. "I'm a good,
ordinary, common seaman. But you've got imagination, and foresight,
and nerve, and daring, and that's the stuff that admirals are made of."

"Bless you, T. A.! I knew you'd see the thing as I do after the first
shock was over. It has always been nip and tuck between the Sans-Silk
Company and us. You gave me the hint that showed me their plans. Now
help me follow it up."

Buck picked up his hat, squared his shoulders and fumbled with his
gloves like a bashful schoolboy.

"You--you couldn't kill two birds with one stone on this trip, could
you, Mrs. Mack?"

Mrs. McChesney, back at her desk again, threw him an inquiring glance
over her shoulder.

"You might make it a combination honeymoon and Featherloom expedition."

"T. A. Buck!" exclaimed Emma McChesney. Then, as Buck dodged for the
door: "Just for that, I'm going to break this to you. You know that I
intended to handle the Middle Western territory for one trip, or until
we could get a man to take Fat Ed Meyers' place."

"Well?" said Buck apprehensively.

"I leave in three days. Goodness knows how long I'll be gone! A
business deal down there is a ceremony. And--you won't need any
white-flannel clothes in Rock Island, Illinois."

Buck, aghast, faced her from the doorway.

"You mean, I----"

"Just that," smiled Emma McChesney pleasantly. And pressed the button
that summoned the stenographer.

In the next forty-eight hours, Mrs. McChesney performed a series of
mental and physical calisthenics that would have landed an ordinary
woman in a sanatorium. She cleaned up with the thoroughness and
dispatch of a housewife who, before going to the seashore, forgets not
instructions to the iceman, the milkman, the janitor, and the maid.
She surveyed her territory, behind and before, as a general studies
troops and countryside before going into battle; she foresaw factory
emergencies, dictated office policies, made sure of staff organization
like the business woman she was. Out in the stock-room, under her
supervision, there was scientifically packed into sample-trunks and
cases a line of Featherloom skirts and knickers calculated to dazzle
Brazil and entrance Argentina. And into her own personal trunk there
went a wardrobe, each article of which was a garment