"Say, kid, how much are you going to hang me up for?"

"Well, if you give me fifty dollars a month, I'll stick to you."

"Holy mother of all that's evil; the devil and Tom Walker! Say, who do
you take after? Not your daddy. He's easy. Fifty dollars a month? Say, I
worked two years and had a wife and two children to take care of and I
never cleared forty dollars a month. I've been a lifetime working myself
up to what I am and you jump into the game, inexperienced, green as a
cucumber, and want to hog the persimmons at the start. 'Taint fair,
'taint right; I'm an honest man; I want to treat everybody right. You're
taking advantage of me. It's the principle of the thing I look at."

"Well, get another boy, you can find one any day. If I stay with this
panorama I will get fifty dollars a month."

"Yes, and if I permit you to hold me up this time, the next move you'll
want the panorama. Your Uncle William served his time like an honest
boy, he has made a fortune. He has the best farm in Fayette County; he
has money, he is the judge of the county court. He never got where he is
by breaking written agreements."

"Yes, but that was different, Uncle William was learning a trade. He got
all kinds of chances to make money on the outside of his work."

"Hold on right there--I'll give you any opportunity you want to make
money on the side. You can sell the "Life of John Bunyan," "The
Pilgrim's Progress," "Paradise Lost," the steel engraving of the twelve
apostles or anything we sell and I'll allow you a good, big
commission."

The sale of the above mentioned articles was that which first turned
Alfred against Palmer. The sneaking, wheedling methods he employed, the
subterfuges, the lies in disposing of books and pictures, were the
things which made the man most repulsive to Alfred. He therefore felt
insulted when Palmer offered him the opportunity to make money from this
source. Alfred plainly informed Palmer that he would not have anything
to do with the sale of the books or pictures.

"Huh! I suppose you feel above selling books that are in the libraries
of the best people in the world. You'd prefer, no doubt, to sell pills."

A little abashed, Alfred came back with: "Well, if I did sell pills, I
sold them on the square and at a less price than they were worth and
they were sold to folks that needed them and if they needed them and
wern't able to pay for them they got them free and we didn't lie about
what we did with the