his territory makes a great big mistake. If I'd known that this man
had been buying so many goods, I wouldn't have overlooked him. As it
was, I came very near passing up the town. And I'll tell you another
thing: A man never wants to overlook what may seem to him a small bet.
This fellow gave me that night over seven hundred dollars--a pretty
clean bill in hats, you know, and has made me a first-class customer
and we have become good friends.

"But I'm getting a little ahead of my story! After supper, that night,
I dropped into Andrews' store again. The suspender man was still
there. He had taken my tip and brought in some of his samples. While
Andrews was over at the dry goods side for a few minutes, the
suspender man said to me:

"'I don't believe I can sell this fellow. He says he wants to buy some
suspenders but that mine don't strike him somehow--says they're too
high prices. I've cut a $2.25 suspender to $1.90 but that doesn't seem
to satisfy him, and I'll give you a tip, too--you've been so kind to
me--I heard him say to his buyer that he wasn't going to look you
over. He said to let you come around a few times and leave some of
your money in the town, and then maybe he'd do business with you. I
just thought I'd tell you this so that you'd know how you stood and
not lose any time over it.'

"'Thank you very much,' I said. Now, this sort of thing, you know,
makes you whet your Barlow on your boot leg. I did thank the suspender
man for the tip but I made up my mind that I was going to do business
with Andrews anyway. You know there's lots more fun shooting quail
flying in the brush than to pot-hunt them in a fence corner.