desk."

I looked in my pigeonholes and pulled from one a small ball of string.
Perkins took it in his hand and looked at it with great admiration.

"What is it?" he asked seriously.

"That," I said humoring him, for I knew something great would be evolved
from his wonderful brain, "is a ball of red twine I bought at the
ten-cent store. I bought it last Saturday. It was sold to me by a
freckled young lady in a white shirtwaist. I paid--"

"Stop!" Perkins cried, "what is it?"

I looked at the ball of twine curiously. I tried to see something
remarkable in it. I couldn't. It remained a simple ball of red twine and
I told Perkins so.

"The difference," declared Perkins, "between mediocrity and genius!
Mediocrity always sees red twine; genius sees a ball of Crimson Cord!"

He leaned back in his chair and looked at me triumphantly. He folded his
arms as if he had settled the matter. His attitude seemed to say that he
had made a fortune for us. Suddenly he reached forward, and grasping my
scissors, began snipping off small lengths of the twine.

"The Crimson Cord!" he ejaculated. "What does it suggest?"

I told him that it suggested a parcel from the druggist's. I had often
seen just such twine about a druggist's parcel.