Burton returned his scissors to his pocket, and the lady started for the door, when Gardiner, who had finished with his customer and stood listening to the dialogue, called her back.
“Don’t be in a hurry, Mrs. Mandle,” he said, in a winning voice that appealed to the lady’s instinct for flattery, “there is a web here that Mr. Burton didn’t know about, and perhaps it will suit you.”
Gardiner went behind the counter and pulled out the very eight-cent piece that had been already shown.
“Now here is a ten-cent line that I can recommend to you,” he said, leaning well across the counter and speaking in a confidential voice. Burton was about to point out his mistake, when something in the eye of his employer warned him that the transaction had been taken out of his hands. “This is a regular ten-cent line, and extra value at that, but I got something a little special on it by taking an unusual quantity from the factory at one time. Of course, we generally figure when we get a snap on a purchase that at least part of the bargain should be ours, but with an old and valued customer like you hard and fast rules don’t always apply. It’s something I really should not do, but under the circumstances I will let you have anything up to twenty yards off this web for eight cents.”
Mrs. Mandle beamed with pleasure. “That’s like you, Mr. Gardiner, I always find that I can deal with you. Not that I have anything against this young man——” she continued, as though anxious not to place Burton in an unfavourable light.
“Oh, that’s all right,” laughed Gardiner. “Mr. Burton has general instructions applying to our regular customers, but when he knows you better he will meet your requirements as well as I do, I am sure. Now shall it be twenty yards?”
“I only wanted twelve,” Mrs. Mandle confessed, “but since it is what you might call a bit of a bargain, I believe I will just take the twenty.”
Gardiner smiled genially and measured off the cloth, but Burton observed that as he did so he had a crook in each thumb, which allowed about a half an inch of over-lap on each yard measured. Mrs. Mandle paid for her purchase, and left with a smile to Gardiner and a friendly nod to Burton, and said she would probably be in in a few days with a case of eggs and some other produce.