“Don’t worry about me, Daisy,” Papa urged, his face pressed to the window pane. “The Junction Hotel serves a damn nice steak dinner for fifty-five cents. I could have the stew for thirty-five, but, hell, the difference is worth it. I got running water in my room and I sleep like a top. Last night a couple of B&O train dispatchers and some drummers from an eastern concern dropped in the room and we played poker till midnight. Went out afterward and had as good a Welsh rarebit at the Greek’s as you could get at the Hotel Statler.”

“Didn’t it upset your stomach?” Mama asked, jealously.

Papa reassured her happily on this point. As further cheer he told her that the boss, Mr. Carson, had hinted in so many words that he was the best man he’d ever had on the road, and not to feel that his superior talents went unobserved. This must mean a raise, Papa deduced, for Mr. Carson was far too shrewd a businessman to risk losing him to some bigger firm in a larger city. Say what you would, a man with the brains to build up a business like the London Furniture Company, known all over the world including Canada and California, as makers of the finest merchandise, not excepting Grand Rapids even, was not one to let a man like Harry Willard slip through his fingers. The fact of the matter was that a certain burled walnut dining room set, red tapestry upholstery, eight pieces, was almost certain to be awarded to Papa at Easter time as a reward for salesmanship.

“I don’t know where we’d put it,” Mama said wearily. “There’s no room.”

“We’ll throw out everything else then and make room,” expostulated Papa. “Don’t stand there and tell me you’d turn down a beautiful burled walnut, Empire style, eight-piece dining set—our Number 842a, the finest number in the catalog—just to keep a lot of junk we bought once in Elmville at an auction! How do you think Carson’s wife is going to feel when Carson tells her Harry Willard’s wife doesn’t appreciate Harry getting the salesman’s grand prize for the year? Daisy, I’m surprised at you.”

Either the reproach or the increasing strain of her nursing duties brought tears to Mama’s eyes and this was too much.

“I come here to cheer you up. I stand outside my own home, freezing to death with a cold coming on, just to cheer you up, and you have to cry!” Papa angrily exclaimed. “That’s all the thanks a man gets.”

For some reason Mama did not react to his fit of temper in her usual contrite way, but permitted him to dash around the house to the street without calling him back. She quietly gave the children their supper in bed on a breadboard, rocked Florrie to sleep without singing. When they were almost asleep the doctor called, and later there was a loud banging on the door. It was Papa. He came inside and hugged Mama, in spite of her protests.