"Don't mind my cousin," Alex tells him. "Outside of a tendency to the measles, he's the worst thing we got in our family! We'll take up the financial end of this later." Bright and early the next mornin', or eleven o'clock to be exact, Alex invites me to go with him so's I can watch how he would go about seein' the president of the Brown-Calder Company and sellin' him the Simmons patent collar button. As they is always a chance that Alex will fall down, I went along. We had no trouble at all landin' outside the president's office, but once we got there it was different. "Is Mister Calder in?" says Alex to a blond stenographer, which looks like them movie queens would like to. She puts four stray hairs back of her left ear and arises. "Have you got an appointment?" she inquires. "No," grins Alex, "my nose got that way from bein' hit with a baseball." She had lovely teeth and showed 'em to us. "Cards?" she says next, lookin' from one of us to the other. "I'll play these!" says Alex. "Listen! I wanna go in Mister Calder's office without bein' announced. I ain't seen him for years and he'll be tickled silly when we meet. I wanna sneak in and just be there the first time he looks around. I'm a surprise--see?" She looks kinda doubtful. "W-e-ll, I don't know," she says. "I've only been here since yesterday, but my orders is to let nobody past this gate without first findin' out their business and so forth. Still and all, I don't wanna be harsh with none of the boss's old college chums or nothin' like that. If you can guarantee I won't lose my job, I'll let you get away with it." "If you lose your job," says Alex, openin' the gate and pullin' me in after him, "I'll hire you for five dollars more than you're gettin' here. All right?" "I only trust you're man enough to keep your word," she says. "The boss's office is the first one to the left." "Thanks," says Alex. "Them eyes of yours is alone worth the trip!" This guy Calder's door is open and he's sittin' at a big desk writin' away on somethin' like everything depended on speed. He's a great, big fat bird, with one of them trick Chaplin mustaches and he's smokin' a cigar as big as he is. His head is playin' it's hairless day. All in all, he looked like big business, and my knees is knockin' together till I'm afraid he'll hear 'em and turn around. Alex gumshoes up to the desk and without sayin' a word, he lays the neckband right down beside Calder, who immediately swings around with a snort. "What's all this--how did you get in here?" he bellers. "We took the subway down from Ninety-sixth Street," says Alex. "That thing you got in your hand is the neckband of a shirt." "Well?" growls Calder, tappin' the desk with a lead pencil.