"Eat these," he said, "and good they will do you."

"Much obliged," replied John. "I'll try a herring with bread and butter
and vinegar to supper. Very much obliged. It was not my blame that we
quarreled. Others had his eye on the agency."

"Tish, I did not want the old Mermaid. You keep her. I got the sole
agency for the Gwendoline."

"How is Gwendolines going?"

"More than I can do to keep ztok of her. Four dozen gents' laces and
three dozen ladies' ditto on the twenty-fifth, and soon I order another
four dozen ladies' buttons."

John called Ann and to her he said: "How is Mermaid ztok?"

"We are almost out of nine gents and four ladies," answered Ann.

"Write Nuncle Silas the order and he'll drop her in the Zity. Pay your
fare one way will I, Silas."

Silas fled the next day into the Mermaid warehouse and sought out the
manager. "My brother J. Owen and Co. Thornton East has sold his last
pair of Mermaids," he said.

He brought trouble into his eyes and made his voice to quiver as he told
how that John was dying and how that the shop was his brother's legacy
to him. "Send you the goods for this order to my shop in Barnes," he
added. "And all future orders. That will be my headquarters."