Page:Frank Packard - The Miracle Man.djvu/106

 and he became, with reservations, noticeably impressed.

A metropolitan newspaper man was struck with the idea of a humorous series of articles to pay for his vacation, entitled, "Characters I Have Met In Maine"—and forthwith, perched on the back of the seat behind the Flopper, proceeded to sketch out the first one, with the mental determination to get off at Needley for the local color necessary to its climax.

A soap drummer nudged a fellow drummer whose line was lingerie. "Ever do Needley?" he grinned.

The lingerie exponent had a sense of humor—he grinned back.

"My house is everlastingly rubbing it into me to open up new territory," said the soap salesman.

"Me too," responded the white-goods man.

"Needley," said he of the soap persuasion, "would be virgin soil for any drummer."

"I'd like to see the finish," said the lingerie man—still grinning.

"Well?" inquired the soap man—still grinning. "What do you say?"

"You bet!" said the man with eight trunks full of daintiness in the baggage car ahead. "It's Needley for ours—you're on!"

The Flopper was an artist—and he was in his glory. Where his position was indubitably weak, he side-stepped with the frank admission that he knew no more than they. He knew only one