shapely, notably commercial in aspect, thickly covered with crisp, dark-brown hair and fixed on a pair of square shoulders and a stocky body. Already his eyes had the look that subtle ye

Once he had let a small note of his become overdue at the bank, but his father raised such a row that he never forgot it. "I would rather crawl on my hands and knees than let my paper go to protest," the old gentlem

he books at first as assistant bookkeeper, vice Mr. Thomas Trixler, dismissed, and in two weeks George said: "W

"He won't be a bookkeeper long, though. I want to see if h

were child's play to Frank. He went through them with an ease

satisfy himself he ran back over certain accounts in the ledger, verifying his suspicions. Bookkeeping did not interest him except as a record, a demonstration of a firm's life. He knew he would not do this long. Something else would happen; but he saw instantly what the grain and commission business was - every detail of it. He saw where, for want of greater activity in offering the goods consigned - quicker communication with shippers and buyers, a better working agreement with surrounding commission men - this house, or, rather, its customers, for it had nothing, endured severe losses

Brother George's attention to the condition of certain accounts, making suggestions as to their possible liquidation or discontinuance, which pleased that individual

somebody had to go into the street or the Exchange to buy and usually he did this. One morning, when way-bills indicated a

going to be overcrowded with flour. We can't be paying storage charges, and our orders won't eat it up. We're short

try," said

as his office. He hurried to the principal commission-merchants, learning what the state of the flour market was, and offering his surplus at the very rate he would have expected to get for it if there had been no prospective glut. Did they want to buy for immediate delivery (forty-eight hours being immediate) six hundred barrels of prime flour? He would offer it at nine dollars straight, in the barrel. They did not. He offered it in f

man?" he asked, leaning

perw

ny? You want to make a record, no

od merel

our flour. I need

lnut Street, with whom his firm dealt, and had them bid in the gr

quick. Sold old Genderman two hundred barrels direct, did y

, s

do that sort of work on the stree

ers, breaking gluts by disposing of odd lots in unexpected quarters. Indeed the Watermans were astonished at his facility in this respect. He had an uncanny faculty for getting appreciative hearings, making friends, being introduced

have to make Cowperwood a liberal present. He has

uess he's worth it. He's certainly done everything we'

t? Do you ever hear him s

y much, I guess. You s

rtner in this business some day. He has the real knack for it. You se

y-bills and certificates of consignment preparatory to leaving all in

he flaring gaslight and looking at his

now was making a speckled patte

before I wind up,

he past six months. We wanted to make some acknowledgment, and we thought about five hundred dollar

"I didn't expect that much. It's a good deal. I'v

ned it. You can stay with us as long as y

very comfortable under this evidence of approval. He looked

knew that; under him things moved smoothly. It never occurred to him that he belonged in the realm of clerkdom. Those people were the kind of beings who ought to work for him, and who would. There was nothing savage in his attitude, no rage against

his girl, Marjorie Stafford, he told his father of th

an. "You're doing better than I tho

hink I'll quit so

hy

It's all right, but I'd rather try my hand

re doing them an injus

le surveying himself in a mirror, strai

told you

going to

other was, and slipping his arms around her l

ked, looking affecti

t, and I get thirty a week next yea

that fine! They must like you. You're

u want for

want anything. I

l right. Then

he would buy

's waist, and saying that he'd be back about midnight, hurried t

argy?" he asked, after kissing her in the dim

le thing, only fifteen,

edn't get m

squeezing her waist and

on this way in the world a