s
morning, in the conference at eleven-thirty between himself, Conrad
Lyte, and Archibald Purdy.

V

Conrad Lyte was a real-estate speculator. He was a nervous speculator.
Before he gambled he consulted bankers, lawyers, architects, contracting
builders, and all of their clerks and stenographers who were willing
to be cornered and give him advice. He was a bold entrepreneur, and he
desired nothing more than complete safety in his investments, freedom
from attention to details, and the thirty or forty per cent. profit
which, according to all authorities, a pioneer deserves for his risks
and foresight. He was a stubby man with a cap-like mass of short gray
curls and clothes which, no matter how well cut, seemed shaggy. Below
his eyes were semicircular hollows, as though silver dollars had been
pressed against them and had left an imprint.

Particularly and always Lyte consulted Babbitt, and trusted in his slow
cautiousness.

Six months ago Babbitt had learned that one Archibald Purdy, a grocer
in the indecisive residential district known as Linton, was talking of
opening a butcher shop beside his grocery. Looking up the ownership of
adjoining parcels of land, Babbitt found that Purdy owned his present
shop but did not own the one available lot adjoining. He advised Conrad
Lyte to purchase this lot, for eleven thousand dollars, though an
appraisal on a basis of rents did not indicate its value as above nine
thousand. The rents, declared Babbitt, were too low; and by waiting they
could make Purdy come to their price. (This was Vision.) He had to bully
Lyte into buying. His first act as agent for Lyte was to increase the
rent of the battered store-building on the lot. The tenant said a number
of rude things, but he paid.

Now, Purdy seemed ready to buy, and his delay was going to cost him ten
thousand extra dollars--the reward paid by the community to Mr. Conrad
Lyte for the virtue of employing a broker who had Vision and
who understood Talking Points, Strategic Values, Key Situations,
Underappraisals, and the Psychology of Salesmanship.

Lyte came to the conference exultantly. He was fond of Babbitt, this
morning, and called him "old hoss." Purdy, the grocer, a long-nosed man
and solemn, seemed to care less for Babbitt and for Vision, but Babbitt
met him at the street door of the office and guided him toward the
private room with affectionate little cries of "This way, Brother
Purdy!" He took from the corresponden