Cheques
talk. He departed with Bostocks' name at the head of his list, and he
used them as a clinching argument with other shops. But the prejudice
against his youth was strong and general. "Yes," tradesmen would answer,
"what you say is all right, but you are so young." As if to insinuate
that a man must be either a rascal or a fool until he is thirty, just as
he must be either a fool or a physician after he is forty. Nevertheless,
he had soon compiled a list of several score shops.
His mother said:
"Why don't you grow a beard? Here you spend money on razors, strops,
soaps and brushes, besides a quarter of an hour of your time every day,
and cutting yourself--all to keep yourself from having something that
would be the greatest help to you in business! With a beard you'd look
at least thirty-one. Your father had a splendid beard, and so could you
if you chose."
This was high wisdom. But he would not listen to it. The truth is, he
was getting somewhat dandiacal.
At length his scheme lacked naught but what Denry called a "right-down
good starting shove." In a word, a fine advertisement to fire it off.
Now, he could have had the whole of the first page of the _Signal_
(at that period) for five-and-twenty pounds.
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