n Van
Dorn said:

"But the advertising, Perny--you forget that. Even if we do lose money
on subscriptions the first few months, we can afford it for the sake of
a subscription list that will swell the advertising returns."

"By gad, yes," said Livingstone. "That's so--the advertising!"

Perner lay back on the couch wearily.

"Yes," he admitted; "the advertising ought to help. I keep forgetting
that. I wish Bates would make a statement, though, of just what he's
done in that line. He talks enough and seems to be getting along. He's
kept pretty straight lately, too."

"Why don't you call on him for a statement?" asked Livingstone.

"Well, I have meant to, but he's so peculiar, you know, and I didn't
want to offend him."

"No; of course, we can't afford to do that now," Van Dorn agreed. "We're
under obligations to Bates for placing our advertising with Jackson. I
don't believe anybody else would have taken it without money down. Bates
having worked there once is the reason he did it."

Livingstone was painting on his picture of the bread line.

"I've a mind to make one of these fellows look like Bates," he laughed,
"out of gratitude."

"Do it," urged Perner. "He'll be there some day if he keeps on
drinking."

"How much advertising did we take, in all?" asked Van Dorn, presently.

Perner went somewhat into detail in his reply:

"Well, you see, we made the 'Sunday-School Union' a page instead of a
half-page so we could get in the big cut of the Bible, and we took a
half-page instead of a quarter in 'Boy's Own' so's to get in the gun and
the camera, with a small cut of the watch. Then we took a page each in
two school papers to get in the gun and Bible both, and the small cuts
of the watch and camera. All these, of course, are in addition to what
we had counted on before. It amounts to about thirteen hundred dollars
in all."

There were some moments of silence after this statement. None of them
had any superstition concerning this particular number of hundreds, and
the amount was pitifully small compared to the figures they had used
from time to time so recklessly in estimating their returns. For some
unexplained reason, however, the sudden reality of the sum, and the dead
certainty that this was not a mirage of champagne or a fancy of smoke,
but a hard, cold fact that had to be met with money, caused the two
listeners to have a cold, sinking sensation in stomachs that were none
too full. Van Dorn was first