“I dunno,” says Silas, grabbing into his beard and yanking it off to one side. “Let’s go into the office,” says Mark. “Never calc’lated to have much office,” says Silas. “That there room was built for one, but seems like I never had no need for it. I jest wandered around.” “Oh!” says Mark. “Who kept the books?” “Books?” says Silas. “Oh yes, books. To be sure—books.” “Yes, ledgers and journals and such like.” “Never had one.” “How ever did you manage to git along?” “Hain’t I been a-tellin’ you I didn’t git along? I busted.” “But how did you run without books?” “Why,” says Silas, “if I owed a feller he sent me a bill, and if I had any money I paid him. If a feller owed me I calc’lated he’d pay me some day, if he was honest, and I kep’ sort of track of that on these here pieces of wood. Whenever I sold a man an order I put it down here, and if he didn’t pay after a while I guessed maybe he didn’t figger to pay, so I chucked the hunk of board over into the office room. There’s quite some boards in there.” “Didn’t you send out invoices?” “Invoices? Didn’t calc’late to. Used to set down and write a letter once in a while askin’ for money.” “I’m s’prised,” says Mark, his voice not getting a bit sarcastic, but his eyes looking that way considerable—“I’m s’prised you went busted.” “I hain’t,” says Silas. “I always went busted. Seems like goin’ busted was a habit of mine.” “Have any cost system?” “What’s one of them?” says Silas, looking around bewildered—like as if he expected one to come up and lick his hand. “Never seen one around here!” “A cost system is the way you find out how much it costs you to manufacture—how much it c-c-costs to make a hundred d-drumsticks or a h-hundred dumb-bells and sich. Didn’t you know that?” “Course not,” said Silas. “What’s the difference, anyhow?” “How could you f-f-figger your sellin’ prices?” “Mostly I took what was offered.” “Um!...” says Mark, and for a minute he looked clean discouraged. “What did your l-l-logs cost you?” “I figgered to pay twelve dollars a thousand.” “How much did it cost to h-h-handle ’em?” “How should I know?” Mark waggled his head like he didn’t feel very comfortable inside of it. “Course you don’t know what the l-labor cost on each article?” “Now you look here, Mark Tidd, I hain’t no ’cyclopedy. How ever you think I was goin’ to know them things?” “Know how many drumsticks you got out of a thousand f-foot of timber?” “Never counted.” “Near as I can g-gather,” says Mark, “the main thing you know about this b-b-business is that it’s busted.” “Calc’late you’re right,” says Silas. “Men work by the piece or by the d-day?” “Some of both,” says Silas. It looked pretty close to hopeless. I didn’t understand exactly what Mark was getting at all the time, but I sensed some of it, and it looked to me like we was grabbing holt of about as big a muddle as anybody ever saw. “Could we start up this mill to-morrow?” Mark asked.