vine! Huh?

[6]

Now that it was all settled in the leader’s active mind that we were going to be the prosperous proprietors of Tutter’s first and foremost Pickle Parlor, we did the squinting act up and down Main Street to find a suitable location for our young gold mine, thus getting track of an empty store building. It looked awfully big and roomy to me. I tried to picture in my mind what it would look like when we got it filled up with pickles. And my uneasy conclusion was that if we did succeed in filling it up with pickles we’d have enough pickles to feed the whole United States for the next sixty-seven years. Finding out who owned the empty building we trotted down the street to the Canners Exchange Bank, where we asked to see Mr. Foreman Pennykorn, the president.

Of the three Tutter banks Mr. Pennykorn’s bank[7] is the smallest and shabbiest. It gets its name from the canning factory that he owns. And if it wasn’t for this factory I dare say the bank wouldn’t have any business at all. For people as a rule don’t like to do business with that kind of a bank any more than they like to trade in a dingy, sleepy-looking store. I’ve heard it said that the Pennykorn family is one of the richest in the county. But old Mr. Pennykorn is too tight fisted to spend any of his money for adding machines and other up-to-date bank stuff.

[7]

Waiting outside of the president’s office, at the orders of the grumpy, suspicious-eyed cashier, we heard voices through the unlatched door. Nor did we feel that it was our duty to stuff up our ears.

“And what price have you posted for early sweet corn?” we heard Mr. Pennykorn inquire, from which we gathered that he was talking with his son, Mr. Norman Pennykorn, who runs the canning factory.

“Nine dollars a ton.”

“Too much; too much,” came in a sort of petulant, disapproving voice.

“But the farmers won’t sell for any less.”

“Um.... What’s the Ashton Canning Company paying?”

“Ten-fifty.”

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