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Show THE DRY GOODS CLERK EACH of us cherishes a secret ambition, ambi-tion, I have no doubt. Our hired man, who never succeeded in writing a complete sentence, and who would not have recognized a joke if he had met one face to face, confessed to me ence that he'd "like to run one o' them funny colems in a . daily newspaper," and Fenton, my neighbor who weighs 300 pounds and has never been able to learn how to navigate a Ford, admitted ad-mitted that he'd like best of all to be an aviator. As for myself, perfect bliss has always al-ways seemed to me incarnate in the young fellow who sold things in a dry goods and genrs' furnishing store. If I could ever have helped out with the Christmas trade at Gulick's who ran such an emporium in our village, I should have been content, and asked for nothing in my Christmas stocking. But such joy has always been denied me. Herb Weston had charge of the "gents' furnishings" in the store, and rre was to me the last word in sartorial sarto-rial perfection, and the object of my secret envy. He was plump and Impressive Im-pressive of physique, and his clothes ivere without a wrinkle. He was considered con-sidered the social dictator of the village. vil-lage. He affpeted spfits and a cutaway cut-away coat buttoned over a gloriously brocaded vest. His socks were radiant; radi-ant; but the crowning feature of his nrtire was a large pearl pin stuck at a rakish angle through his cravat. It seemed to my boyish eyes priceless and unattainable. I have since, In Rome, bought a handful of similar jewels for three lire. Young girls adored Herb; yL.un.g men envied him. He had such self-possession, self-possession, such assurance, such perfection per-fection of appearance and such opulence. opul-ence. His salary. I was told, was S40 a mouth! It seemed incredible. I was too much of a yokel for him to give nie a thought. I came from (he farm and my clothes were common and ill-fitting. He laughed at me one day as he saw me mounting Moses, our old gray horse, who was covered with mud from nil ling in the street while I had been making some purchases pur-chases in the store. His cynical smile chilled me. That was the end of my ambition. I realized real-ized with a sad heart that It was far too high for my attainment and future events have proved that I was right. I have had to be contented with a humbler hum-bler lot. |