my boy his raise."

"If they'd listen to me, that department would--"

"'Shh-h! J. G. Hoffheimer don't have to get pointers from Jimmie Batch how
to run his department store."

"There you go again. What's J. G. Hoffheimer got that I 'ain't? Luck and a
few dollars in his pocket that, if I had in mine, would--

"It was his own grit put those dollars there, Jimmie. Just put it out of
your head that it's luck makes a self-made man."

"Self-made! You mean things just broke right for him. That's two-thirds of
this self-made business."

"You mean he buckled right down to brass tacks, and that's what my boy is
going to do."

"The trouble with this world is it takes money to make money. Get your
first few dollars, I always say, no matter how, and then when you're on
your feet scratch your conscience if it itches. That's why I said in the
beginning, if we had took that hundred and ninety furniture money and
staked it on--"

"Jimmie, please--please! You wouldn't want to take a girl's savings of
years and years to gamble on a sporty cigar proposition with a card-room in
the rear. You wouldn't, Jimmie. You ain't that kind of fellow. Tell me you
wouldn't, Jimmie."

He turned away to dive down into the barrel. "Naw," he said, "I wouldn't."

The sun had receded, leaving a sudden sullen gray, the little square room,
littered with an upheaval of excelsior, sheet-shrouded furniture, and the
paperhanger's paraphernalia and inimitable smells, darkening and seeming to
chill.

"We got to quit now, Jimmie. It's getting dark and the gas ain't turned on
in the meter yet."

He rose up out of the barrel, holding out at arm's-length what might have
been a tinsmith's version of a porcupine.

"What in--What's this thing that scratched me?"

She danced to take it. "It's a grater, a darling grater for horseradish and
nutmeg and cocoanut. I'm going to fix you a cocoanut cake for our
honeymoon supper to-morrow night, honey-bee. Essie Wohlgemuth over in the
cake-demonstrating department is going to bring me the recipe. Cocoanut
cake! And I'm going to fry us a little steak in this darling little
skillet. Ain't it the cutest!"

"Cute she calls a tin skillet."

"Look what's pasted on it. 'Little Housewife's Skillet. The Kitchen Fairy.'
That's what I'm going to be, Jimmie, the kitchen fairy. Give me that. It's
a rolling-pin. All my life I've wanted a rolling-pin. Look, honey, a little
string to hang it up by. I'm going to hang everything