ybody
ought to strengthen your hands, instead of putting obstacles in the
way."

"I must be prepared for all things."

Maverick was very enthusiastic over the coffee-house. It was a new
institution in Yerbury. There had been in good times several so-called
cheap lunch-rooms, but the fare was invariably poor.

"Keppler will be your first enemy, and your worst one," said the doctor
with a shrewd smile.

"Very well. He must fight Miss Barry and Miss Morgan. I did send a man
to do some work, but Miss Barry paid the bills. I keep my hands out of
it altogether."

"Good for you, Jack. And how does business progress?"

"I am dubious," and Jack shook his head in a mock-serious way. "There is
too much rose-color. Every thing works to a charm. Whether people really
have learned something by the hard times, remains to be seen; but it
looks so now. And we couldn't have a better working firm. Owen Cameron
is the same kind of a man that Miss Morgan is for a woman, not stingy
here and wasteful there, but a thorough-going economist. Every week he
makes a little saving somewhere. It is what we needed to learn, badly
enough. He manages to make the men understand that every penny saved is
for the benefit of all, that a yard of cloth or a pound of wool spoiled
is to the loss of all. And that is the only way to settle this business,
this everlasting wrangle between labor and capital."

Amos Hurd and Peter Yardley used to talk over the other scheme of a
co-operative store. It would not do to have too many irons in the fire
in such times as these, when no one had any great deal of money. But it
did seem as if poor people were paying at the dearest rate for every
thing, partly because they asked for trust, and the only man willing to
trust them to any extent kept a very full line of second or third rate
articles, but the prices did not always correspond.

"Now, there's coal," said Yardley one evening. "At the trade-sale it
went up ten cents a ton on the average. Our dealers here, who had their
yards full, put up their prices from twenty to thirty cents. I know, on
the other hand, if coal takes a sudden tumble, they may lose; but, after
watching this thing for years, I find the prices go up five times with
full yards, where they fall once. Now, I was thinking, when coal was
bought for the mill, some extra car-loads might be ordered for the men."

"Yes," and Hurd opened his eyes widely. "Let us talk to Darcy about it."

Jack listened