A Man of Samples | Page 5

they were obliged to make them better, and they are just
as reliable as any other to-day."
"Well, I don't want any."
"All right, we will pass it. But I wondered what one of your
competitors meant when he said he had the pistol trade; now I
understand."
"Does he sell these?"
"Yes, he had some from us not long ago, and gave me an order for
more to-day."
"What's the best you can do on them?"
How many times a day does every traveling man see men act as Tucker
did? Here was a line of goods he was cocksure he did not want, but the
moment he heard that his competitor had a trade on them he began to
feel that he must have some. Seven-eighths of the goods sold are sold
in this way. Very few men do business on their own judgment. Their
competitors make their prices, select their styles, and force them to
carry certain stock. The drummer's best card is always: This is selling

like fire; Smith took a gross, Brown half a gross, Jones three dozen, and
you will miss it if you do not try a few. Such dealers always have the
larger part of their capital locked up in goods they bought because
others had bought the same goods.
I repeated my price to Tucker, and he told me to send him a few. "By
the way," said he, "what are your terms?"
"Sixty days."
"Does your house draw the day a bill falls due?"
"No; the house is slow about drawing upon customers, and they always
give ten days' notice before making draft."
"Well, I don't like to be drawn on. The house that draws on me can't
sell me again. I can't draw on my trade, and I'm devilish glad to get my
money in six months, but you fellows in the city expect a man to come
to the exact minute. I don't want any drawing on me."
It was an excellent place to have delivered a lecture on the beauties of
prompt payments. I could have told Brother Tucker that if he did not
see his way clear to pay his bill when due he should not buy it, and if
his customers did not pay promptly he should dun them harder or keep
his goods. But the traveling man is not sent out to inculcate business
morals, and he is too anxious to sell a bill to run any risks by
disagreeing with a buyer. I did what all others would have done in my
place. I assured Mr. Tucker I would be as easy with him regarding
payments as any house in the world would dare be, and that point
safely out of the way, I sold him several items quite smoothly. We
came to guns.
"What is Parker's worth?"
"Twenty-five per cent, off factory list."
"What! Why, here's a quotation from Cincinnati of 25 and 10!"

"Let me see it, please. I have not heard of any such figures."
"Bob, where is that list of Reachum's?"
"I don't know."
"D--n it, you had it."
"Then it must be in the drawer."
Tucker emptied the drawer, looked through a pile of papers, but could
not find the circular he was looking for He was annoyed by it, and I
was sorry.
"Well, let it go," said he, "but that was the price."
"There must be a mistake somewhere," said I, "for the goods cost that
at the factory in largest lots."
"There was no mistake," he said sharply; "I know what I am talking
about. The discount offered was 25 and 10."
I hastened to assure him that I had not meant that he was mistaken, but
that Reachum must have made a mistake.
"That's no concern of mine," said he, "and I rather think that Reachum
is a man who knows his business as well as any of you. If you are
higher than he is on guns you probably are on other goods. I guess you
had better cancel that order."
Here was a pretty how-do-you-do! How was I to get out of this box? I
confess I was in great doubts as to what to do or say. I dared not sell
Parker's guns at any such price, yet the man would cancel the order and
probably always have a grudge against the house unless I sold him now.
I could not believe that Reachum had made this price, and yet there was
no telling what that house might or might not do.
"How many Parker guns do you want?" I asked.

"I don't want any. I only asked because it is a leading thing, and if a
house is not low on that I conclude it is high on other goods."
"I was going