Mark and I scooted along, keeping mostly to back streets until we were where nobody was likely to see us; then we turned toward the river and went down to Mr. Barnes’s house. His place sat on top of a bluff, but down on the river level he owned quite a strip of flat ground that he used for a garden when the flood didn’t come and clean it out. We sort of nosed around, and pretty soon we run across Wiggamore and Jason Barnes sitting on a bench out on the edge of the bluff. There was a clump of lilac-bushes just back of them, and we got back of the clump. We could hear good.

“The dam,” says Wiggamore, “will go across right there,” and he pointed down at our dam. “Our engineers figure to make it about eighty feet high. The water won’t come over the top, but will be released as we want it through a tunnel under the dam. So, from here back will be a lake. Fine thing for the town.”

“Fine,” says Jason. “I dunno’s I got any especial use for a lake, but I kin see how folks might. Have boats on it, and sich. As for me, I wouldn’t git in no boat. Not any kind of a boat. I’m one of these dry-land fellers, I am. As long, I says to myself, as you stay on dry land and it don’t rain too hard, you hain’t ever goin’ to git drownded.”

“You’re right,” said Mr. Wiggamore. “But what I wanted to see you about was this: We want to buy that dam site down there. It belongs to a man named Bugg.”

“Silas Doolittle Bugg,” says Jason.

“But he doesn’t seem to have much to do with it. As nearly as I can make out, he has turned it over to a boy by the name of Tidd.”

“Marcus Aurelius Fortunatus Tidd,” says Jason.

“A fat boy,” says Wiggamore, “and an impertinent one. I talked with him a few minutes, and it was all I could do to keep my hands off him.”

“Better let him alone. Better let him alone,” says Jason. “Folks mostly don’t interfere with him.”

“He said he wouldn’t sell the dam for less than fifteen thousand dollars—and that included the mill.”

“If he says so,” Jason let on, “why, I guess that’s what he means. You want to inquire around some about that boy. He’s smarter ’n greased lightnin’.”

“I’ll smart him,” says Wiggamore. “I want your help.”

“Um!... I’ve lived a peaceful life, Mr. Wiggamore, and I hain’t hankerin’ to mix in with Mark Tidd.”

“I’m talking business. You can understand that I’ve got to have that dam. It is the only place where we can build a dam for this reservoir, but I’m not going to pay him any ridiculous price for it. We might go a thousand or so, but that’s all. I’ve looked up this man Bugg, and he’s pretty close to bankrupt.”

“So folks says. It’s my nature to mind my own business and not mix into other folks’s affairs.”

“Unless there’s money in it,” says Wiggamore.

“That,” says Jason, “might put another light onto it.”

“I’m willing to pay you for your services. Now what I want you to do is to nose around and see if you can find where Bugg owes any money. Then buy up the debts as cheaply as you can. I’ll furnish the money.”

“What do you want of sich debts? Silas hain’t much on payin’ debts. ’Tain’t as though he made a habit of payin’ up. Mostly he forgits ’em.”

“I’ll see that he remembers. As soon as we own those debts, we’ll throw him into bankruptcy and bid in the property for a trifle.”

“Um!... Like I says a minute back, I hain’t for proddin’ in other folks’s business.”

“When I pay you it becomes your business, doesn’t it?”

“To be sure. To be sure. Makes all the difference in the world. I was just sayin’ the other day that money always makes a difference. Yes, sir. If you got money you’re different than what you be if you hain’t. If you want money you’re different than what you be if you don’t want it. On the other hand, if there wasn’t no money not much of anythin’ would make any difference, eh? I’m a sensible man, Mr. Wiggamore, and I calc’late not to let no day end without I’ve added some to what I got in the savin’s-bank. My view of money is this: It’s somethin’ to git all of that you kin, and to let go of as little of as you got to. If you got a dollar, why, you got a dollar; if you up and spend it, what you got then? Nothin’ but vain regrets, says I.”

“Right,” says Mr. Wiggamore. “I see you are a wise man, and I like to do business with wise men. I’m sure I shall find much work for you, for I need men who think the way you do.”

“Much obleeged,” says Jason, purring like a tabby-cat laying in a sunbeam. You could ’most see him hump up his back to be scratched. “The only thing I don’t take to about this here is that Mark Tidd is in it. But I calc’late you and me is equal to one fat boy. Now maybe I got some suggestions like. You kin bet that there Tidd boy will make money out of that mill if he’s let be. He’s got the knack of it. If he’s let be, mark you! Was you willin’ to see him let be, or would it be worth a man’s while to sort of kind of mix in once in a while?”

“For instance?”

“Things happens in mills,” says Jason, confidential-like. “Somethin’ might get wedged into the water-wheel. There’s ways of messin’ up machinery so’s it won’t run.”

“I see you’re going to be a valuable man for me.”

“Um!... Wa-al, suppose we was to bind the bargain, then.”

“Eh? Bind the bargain?”

“I was wonderin’ how I was goin’ to be able to put any money in that savin’s-account of mine to-morrer.”

“Oh! And how much will bind the bargain?”

“Suppose we was to say five dollars.”

Wiggamore grunted and handed over a bill. I felt Mark pinch me, and he whispered:

“Workin’ cheap, hain’t he? I hain’t much afraid of a f-f-feller that’ll sell his d-decency for f-five dollars. Now if he’d ’a’ stuck Wiggamore for a hunderd I’d been some worried. About all Jason’s goin’ to be is a nuisance—that and sorry.”

“I’d admire to make him sorry,” says I.

“Jest be p-patient. Jason’s goin’ to wisht he never see or heard of Wiggamore and his f-f-five-dollar bills. I’m goin’ to do some hard thinkin’ about Jason.” Then he says: “Come on. I calc’late we’ve heard about all there is to hear.”

“Wonder if Silas Doolittle really owes anybody money?”

“Most likely. He wouldn’t know, though. We got to go diggin’ into him for d-d-debts like you dig in a mine. Maybe we’ll scoop some up, and maybe we’ll just have to wait till they t-turn up.” He stopped and banged his leg. “No, we won’t have to w-wait. We’ll sort of nip Mr. Wiggamore’s scheme in the bud.”

“How?” says I.

“Advertise,” says he.

“I dunno’s I understand.”

“L-let’s git under a light where I kin see,” says he, “and I’ll git up somethin’ to p-put in the paper.”

So we sneaked off like a couple of Injuns and sat down under a street light, and Mark got out some paper and a pencil and went to writing. This is what he wrote:

WARNING.—Wicksville folks is warned to look out for a slick scrouger that is going to go around trying to buy debts. He’s going to try to buy them cheap, but the folks that sell will be sorry. Especially folks that are owed by Silas Doolittle Bugg. If anybody comes to pay you less for a debt than is owed you, don’t take the money. Fetch your bill right to Silas Doolittle Bugg’s mill and give it to Mark Tidd. Silas is getting in shape to pay every honest debt. If Silas owes you money, see Mark Tidd about it right off. But be ready to prove that he owes you. Take warning and don’t sell your debts. There’s a mighty mean trick being done.

“There,” says he, when he got the writing finished. “I guess that will set ’em to t-t-thinkin’. I don’t b’lieve anybody will sell Jason a debt till he sees me first. What you think?”

“If I know Wicksville,” says I, “there’ll be consid’able talk goin’ around when that advertisement comes out in the Trumpet.”

“You bet,” says Mark.

“Let’s git home to bed,” says I. “Between one thing and another to-night I’m ’most done out.”

“Mrs. Coots’ll be layin’ for you with a plaster to p-p-put on your stummick,” says he.

“Before you kin put a plaster on a stummick,” says I, “you got to catch your stummick. Mine’s goin’ to be movin’ around rapid.”

We mogged along home. When we got to the corner where I turn off we stopped a minute, and I says to Mark:

“If anybody sends in debts against Silas Doolittle, what you goin’ to do about it?”

“Do?” says he, surprised-like. “Why, pay ’em, of course!”

“What with?” says I.

“Money,” says he.

“Money,” says I, “is like stummicks—you got to catch both of ’em before you kin use ’em.”

“When you got to have a thing,” says he, “you m-mostly git it.”

That was Mark Tidd all over. If a thing had to be done, or if there was something that he had to have, why, there was an end of it. He didn’t waste time fussing about how hard it was to do, or thinking maybe he couldn’t get it. No, sirree. He just went ahead and tried to get it, and while he was trying he kept right on believing he was going to come out right. He was the kind of a fellow that digs in. I guess maybe that’s one of the main reasons why he manages to do things other folks don’t do. It hain’t always that he’s smarter, though, goodness knows, he is smarter. But he won’t let on that he’s beat till he is beat, and then he won’t let on. It’s hard work and being determined that gets things for him. He’s that stubborn you wouldn’t believe. “I got to do it,” says he, and then he does it. Somebody else would say: “I ought to do it, but I dunno how in tunket I’m going to manage it. Looks like it was impossible.” Well, while that other fellow was worrying and feeling sorry for himself, Mark would have the thing half done.

“How’s your cost system gittin’ on?” says I.

“Fine,” says he. “About Monday we kin b-begin to hustle for b-business. I kin come p-perty clost to tellin’ what it costs to make everythin’ on our list.”

“Was Silas’s prices too low?”

“Low!” says he. “He lost more money on every article he sold than what he was p-paid for it. If he sold a thing for a dollar, like as not he l-lost a dollar and ten cents. I’ve been gettin’ what information I could f-from other mills about their prices. Why, Silas has been undersellin’ everybody scandalous. This hain’t a very big mill, but I’ll say right out in m-meetin’ that if Silas had sold all he made this l-last year at the p-prices I’m goin’ to ask, he could ’a’ paid himself a salary of maybe a hunderd dollars a m-month, and showed a profit besides of two and m-maybe three thousand d-dollars.”

“But he didn’t,” says I.

“He come clost to losin’ that m-much.”

“It’ll take a year to pay his debts—what he owes your father and the rest.”

“We don’t have to worry about F-father. He’ll wait. I’m goin’ to have that d-d-dowel-machinery set up next week, and I calc’late we kin git orders for a l-lot. The way I f-figger, that machinery alone ought to make a profit of eight-ten dollars a day.”

“Mark,” says I, “I been kind of thinkin’ about this Power Company and their dam. It’ll be a good thing for the town and the state.”

“To be sure,” says Mark.

“Somehow it don’t seem just right for a dinky little mill like this to be preventin’ a big public improvement like that, that’s goin’ to cost ’most a million dollars.”

“’Tain’t right,” says Mark, “but it hain’t the m-mill’s fault. It’s Wiggamore’s fault. Is it f-fair for Silas to lose all he’s got to benefit the p-public?”

“Don’t seem so,” says I.

“If there’s g-goin’ to be sich a heap of benefit from takin’ our dam, them thet gits the b-benefit ought to be willin’ to p-pay for it. That’s fair, hain’t it?”

“Yes,” says I.

“Because a thing’s big,” says he, “is no sign it’s got a right to gouge somethin’ else because it’s l-l-little.”

“No.”

“Well, I won’t be f-found standin’ in the way of their Power Company the minute it wants to be fair and d-d-decent. But so long as it tries to smouge Silas I’ll fight. Yes, sir, I’ll fight.”

“Guess you’re right,” says I.

“And,” says he, “one piece of f-f-fightin’ I’m goin’ to do concerns Jason Barnes. He’s a sneakin’ old foozle, and he’s goin’ to wish he never heard of Wiggamore or a dam or Silas before he’s more ’n twenty year older ’n what he is.”

“What do you want for the mill, anyhow? How much you figger Wiggamore ought to pay?”

“What it’s worth,” says he, “and not a cent m-more or a cent l-less.”

“That sounds fair, anyhow,” says I.

“It’s what we’ll git,” says he.

“I’ve heard tell these big companies was hard to beat.”

“Then,” says he, “that jest m-means that m-much more hard work. Because,” says he, “we’re a-goin’ to b-beat ’em.”

“Good night,” says I.