okes a pipe in the house, 'cause
it don't hang round the room so long as cigar smoke does, but he likes a
good cigar to smoke on the street or when he goes ridin'. I just had a
new box come down for him last night. Perhaps some of them will satisfy
yer till I can git jest the kind yer want."

Mr. Hill took his claw-hammer and opening the box passed it to Quincy,
who took one of the cigars and lighted it. As he did so he glanced at
the brand and the names of the makers, and remarked, "This is a good
cigar, I've smoked this brand before. What do you ask for them?"

"I git ten cents straight, but as Mr. Strout always smokes up the whole
box before he gits through, though he don't usually buy more than five
at a time, I let him have 'em for nine cents apiece. There ain't much
made on them, but yer see I have to obleege my customers."

"You don't ask enough for them," said Quincy, throwing down a
twenty-dollar bill. "They sell for fifteen cents, two for a quarter, in
Boston."

"How many will you have?" asked Mr. Hill, thinking that Boston must be a
paradise for shopkeepers, when seven cents' profit could be made on a
cigar that cost only eight cents.

"I'll take the whole box," said Quincy. "Call it ten dollars, that's
cheap enough. No matter about the discount." As he said this he took
half a dozen cigars from the box and placed them in a silver-mounted,
silk-embroidered cigar case. "Please do them up for me, Mr. Hill, and
the next time Hiram Maxwell comes in he will take them down to Deacon
Mason's for me."

After much rummaging through till and pocketbook, Mr. Hill and his son
found ten dollars in change, which was passed to Quincy. He stuffed the
large wad of small bills and fractional currency into his overcoat
pocket and sitting down on a pile of soap boxes drummed on the lower one
with his boot heels and puffed his cigar with evident pleasure.

While Quincy was thus pleasantly engaged, Professor Strout entered the
store and walked briskly up to the counter. He did not see, or if he
did, he did not notice, Quincy who kept his place upon the pile of soap
boxes. Strout was followed by Abner Stiles, Robert Wood, and several
other idlers, who had been standing on the store platform when the
Professor arrived.

"Did those cigars come down, Hill?" asked Strout in his usual pompous
way.

"Yes!" replied Mr. Hill, "but I guess you'll have to wait till I gut
another box down."

"What for?" asked Strout sharply. "Wa'