"You bet I'm all right. Lucky for him he took me unawares. Why, say, I could work around him like a copper around a barrel!" "I bet," she said. And she smiled at him again, nodded, and skipped back into her box. Restored to his own good opinion by her deftness, Paul swaggered back to Hepp's Bargain Basement. He knew that she had seen the episode, and that she could not have misinterpreted it; but still he had not lost face. Hepp was waiting for him. "Where were you the last two hours?" "Aw, I wasn't feeling right." Hepp, a short and big-bellied man with a pink and shining head, compressed his lips. "Look here, Manley, did you make this sale?" [Illustration] "Yes," said Paul, glancing at the sales-slip. "That's some of my work, Mr. Hepp!" "I might have recognized it. You sold this pair of shoes to a colored fellow, and he left his old shoes to be sent home. Well, he was in here just now, raising Cain, and threatening to cut me. You sent him a pair of ladies' dancing pumps in the box instead of his shoes, and he says he forgot the ten dollar bill that he had hidden in his old shoe. And he wanted it!" "Aw, he's a liar!" "Maybe so, but I was in no position to argue. Here's two dollars." "What for? Thank you, Mr. Hepp!" "For your pay up to tonight--twelve dollars, less the ten that I had to give to the colored fellow. Manley, you've got too much brains for the shoe business. You've got too much on your mind besides selling shoes. So we're going to part company. Keep your hat and coat on." "You want me to quit?" "Exactly," said Hepp, walking away. "Good luck, and good-by!" "Then I'll quit!" shouted Paul indignantly. "I'll quit right here and now! Say, Hepp, I want to tell you a few. The matter with you is you don't know how to treat a white man. You're a blamed old slave-driver, that's what you are! You're a mean, stingy old tight-wad! Where do you get that stuff--trying to fire me? Why, say, you old dumb-bell, I forgot more about the shoe business than you ever knew! I got too much brains for you--that's what's the matter. What do you know, anyhow? Put your hat on, you old fool--you're half-naked!" He left the store hurriedly, and ran to the street. He had not had time to remember all the gags which he had saved up in loving anticipation of just this occasion, but he felt he had done pretty well. "I guess I told him where he got off!" he jubilated. III Paul lay in bed late the following morning. He was not much worried; he was out of a job, but he had been out of a job often before. He argued himself into feeling no shame at his discharge; after all, that was the natural end to any term of employment. He twisted and rolled in bed, holding his eyes shut, trying to hang onto sleep, but it finally escaped him. He rose, dressed slowly, pushed over his ninety-eight cent alarm clock and walked down the stairs of his rooming-house. "Mail, Mr. Manley!" called his landlady.