But--well--a guy wouldn't want to take a job away from a woman--
especially a square little trick like McChesney. Of course she's
played me a couple of low-down deals and I promised to get back at
her, but that's business. But--"

"So's this," interrupted Miss Hattie Stitch. "And I don't know that
she is so square. Let me tell you that I heard she's no better than
she might be. I have it on good authority that three weeks ago, at the
River House, in our town--"

Their heads came close together over the little, rose-shaded
restaurant table.

At eleven o'clock next morning Fat Ed Meyers walked into the office of
the T. A. Buck Featherloom Petticoat Company and asked to see old T.
A.

"He's in Europe," a stenographer informed him, "spaing, and
sprudeling, and badening. Want to see T. A. Junior?"

"T. A. Junior!" almost shouted Ed Meyers. "You don't mean to tell me
_that_ fellow's taken hold--"

"Believe _me_. That's why Featherlooms are soaring and Sans-silks are
sinking. Nobody would have believed it. T. A. Junior's got a live wire
looking like a stick of licorice. When they thought old T. A. was
going to die, young T. A. seemed to straighten out all of a sudden and
take hold. It's about time. He must be almost forty, but he don't show
it. I don't know, he ain't so good-looking, but he's got swell eyes."