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Snavely and whipping-boy for Mrs. Pipkin. Monday morning the head of the house arose early and, before Mrs. Pipkin had finished her beauty sleep, that hard-working man was at the door demanding his pay. An hour was all the time she required for dressing. Mr. Cadge wished he had broken his fast before leaving home.
Pipkin herself had not the slightest notion of how much a wall should cost, as she was ignorant of the two factors which determined it, namely, the wages of day-laborers and the time required to build the wall; therefore she requested Mr. Snavely, as a man of affairs, to make the bargain for her. It was well that she did so, for Mr.
Snavely. "I saw one around the corner as I passed; the same one your brats were pelting from behind a fence last week." Mr. Cadge tacked adroitly. "No, I ain't going to spend my money with the loryers, as'd want twelve dollars to get you back six. I'll tear down the wall, that's wot I'll do.
"Yes, work. This 'ere construction company wot's doing the job of grading this vacant block, employs me to sort of look after things, their shovels, scoops, and the like. A kind of private police officer, I am," he concluded, drawing himself up a little and puffing into the air. "And when are you on duty?" asked Mr. Snavely.
"Yes, but a man can't draw pay for two positions at once; 't ain't honest." "Why, this is not a regular situation," protested the upright Snavely, who saw his bill still unpaid; "you could work on it at odd times if you like. She'll pay you by the piece, I am pretty sure, and you will get your six dollars cash when the wall is done."
If I don't get my pay the loidy don't get her wall, and you can tike your measly job and give it to some poor man wot needs it." Mr. Snavely had one foot on the wheel and swung lightly into his cart. "Have it your own way, Cadge," he responded cheerfully.
"Very well," he said, loftily waving his pipe, "I'll drop in Monday and talk this over with you, Snavely. Then if the job suits me I may take it. I don't like to talk business on Sunday, you know." Thus rebuked, Mr. Snavely resumed his homeward way.
Snavely checked himself abruptly, for the light in the small, green eyes of Thomas Cadge was baleful, and his square jaw protruded menacingly. The kindly critic of music had a vague feeling that the subject might be changed to advantage. "Been to church this morning, I suppose?" he inquired briskly with the assurance of a man just returning from that duty.
Snavely, with the air of proprietorship one adopts to hopeless debtors, "three dollars a week is not going to keep your family, to say nothing of paying up that seven dollars. I can't carry you forever, you know. Why don't you get a daylight job?" "Ah, that is easy enough said," protested that injured individual. "'Aven't I tramped the streets day after day, lookin' for work?"
"But it was such a little steak, Tom," urged his wife, "and the children were so hungry that I let them finish it." There was no money in the house, and Snavely, the only credit grocer, had closed his shop, so Mr. Cadge's supper that night was bread and cheese without kisses. Sunday was a long-remembered day of misery for Cadge's wife and children, who played the scapegoat for Mr.
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