With the entire foundry force at the Chiawassee making pipe, Tom had gone early into the market with his low-priced product. But the commercial side of the struggle was fire-new to him, and he found himself matched against men who knew buying and selling as he knew smelting and casting. They routed him, easily at first, with increasing difficulty as he learned the new trade, but always with certainty. It was Norman, the correspondence man, transformed now into a sales agent, who gave him his first hint of the inwardnesses. "We're too straight, Mr. Gordon; that's at the bottom of it," he said to Tom, over a grill-room luncheon at the Marlboro one day. "It takes money to make money." Tom's eyebrows went up and his ears were open. The battle had grown desperate. "Our prices are right," he said. "Isn't that enough?" "No," said Norman, looking down. Like all the others, he stood a little in awe of the young boss. "Why?" "Four times out of five we have to sell to a municipal committee, and the other time we have to monkey with the purchasing agent of a corporation. In either case it takes money--other money besides the difference in price." Tom wagged his head in a slow affirmative. "It's rotten!" he said. Norman smiled. "It's our privilege to cuss it out; but it's a condition." Tom was in town that day for the purpose of taking a train to Louisville, where he was to meet the officials of an Indiana city forced, despite the hard times, to relay many miles of worn-out water-mains. He made a pencil computation on the back of an envelope. The contract was a large one, and his bid, which he was confident was lower than any competitor could make, would still stand a cut and leave a margin of profit. Before he took the train he went to the bank, and, when he reached the Kentucky metropolis, his first care was to assure the "wheel-horse" member of the municipal purchasing board that he was ready to talk business on a modern business basis. Notwithstanding, he lost the contract. Other people were growing desperate, too, it appeared, and his bribe was not great enough. One member of the committee stood by him and gave him the facts. A check had been passed, and it was a bigger check than Tom could draw without trenching on the balance left in the Iron City National to meet the month's pay-roll at Gordonia. "You sent a boy to mill," said the loyal one. "And now it's all over, I don't mind telling you that you sent him to the wrong mill, at that. Bullinger's a hog." "I'd like to do him up," said Tom vindictively. "Well, that might be done, too. But it would cost you something." Tom did not take the hint; he was not buying vengeance. But on the way home he grew bitterer with every subtracted mile. He could meet one more pay-day, and possibly another; and then the end would come. This one contract would have saved the day, and it was lost.