"Always make a point of discounting your bills, even if you have to borrow money from the bank to do it. Let me illustrate what this will save you. Suppose that you can take a two per cent. discount by paying a bill in ten days. Now suppose you allow the bill to run to thirty days. You lose that two per cent. for an accommodation of twenty days. That is at the rate of thirty-six per cent. a year. You can borrow money from the bank at the rate of six per cent. a year, and make so much clear saving. You can figure it out this way, if you like. Your purchases are, let us suppose, about $12,000.00 a year, or $1,000.00 a month. I know they are more than that, but those figures will serve to illustrate my point. On your monthly purchase of $1,000.00 you lose two per cent., or $20.00, by taking a full month instead of paying it in ten days. If you borrow that $1,000.00 from the bank for the twenty days necessary it costs you only $3.33, so that you make $16.67 a month, which amounts to"--he figured it out--"to $200.00 a year!" That was surely a new light on finance to me! "Now," he went on, "it seems to me that your business should be put in such shape that you can take your discounts without even the necessity of borrowing, and you can save the interest. Here you are with sales of about $25,000.00 a year and a stock costing you around $8,000.00 or $9,000.00. Deducting the gross profit from your sales, which amounts to about thirty-three and one-third per cent., it leaves $16,667.00, which means that you are turning over your stock only about twice a year. You should work this up to three and one-half times a year." This question of turn-over seemed to me to be a most important one, judging from the way every one I talked with hammered on it. I realized then that Mr. Peck had done me a good turn, and I felt grateful. "Do you think it is possible, Mr. Peck," I said, "for me to turn my stock over three and one-half times a year?" "Why, yes," he said. "I know many hardware stores that turn their stock over more times than that. Reduce your stock, eliminate the slow-selling lines, buy carefully for the next few months, and you will have no difficulty in taking your discounts. Besides the saving you will make, you will be building up a reputation as a trustworthy man--and that's a decidedly helpful thing for a retail merchant." As he turned to leave I held out my hand and said, with the best grace I could: "I reckon I made a bit of a fool of myself, Mr. Peck. I want to thank you for your help to me." His handclasp as he said good-by was a good, hearty one, and I felt I had a real friend in that credit manager. CHAPTER XIII A NEW KIND OF LOTTERY