Jock thrust his hands hurriedly into his pockets.  He felt his face getting scarlet.

“They’re—­ah—­using ’em young this year,” said Bartholomew Berg.  His voice sounded bigger, and smoother, and pleasanter than ever in contrast with that other’s shrill tone.  “I prefer ’em young, myself.  You’ll never catch McChesney using ‘in the last analysis’ to drive home an argument.  He has a new idea about every nineteen minutes, and every other one’s a good one, and every nineteenth or so’s an inspiration.”  The Old Man laughed one of his low, chuckling laughs.

“Hm—­that so?” piped Ben Griebler.  “Up in my neck of the woods we aren’t so long on inspiration.  We’re just working men, and we wear working clothes—­”

“Oh, now,” protested Berg, his eyes twinkling, “McChesney’s necktie and socks and handkerchief may form one lovely, blissful color scheme, but that doesn’t signify that his advertising schemes are not just as carefully and artistically blended.”

Ben Griebler looked shrewdly up at Jock through narrowed lids.  “Maybe.  I’ll talk to you in a minute, young man—­that is—­” he turned quickly upon Berg—­“if that isn’t against your crazy principles, too?”

“Why, not at all,” Bartholomew Berg assured him.  “Not at all.  You do me an injustice.”

Griebler moved up closer to the broad table.  The two fell into a low-voiced talk.  Jock looked rather helplessly around at Sam Hupp.  That alert gentleman was signaling him frantically with head and wagging finger.  Jock crossed the big room to Hupp’s side.  The two moved off to a window at the far end.

“Give heed to your Unkie,” said Sam Hupp, talking very rapidly, very softly, and out of one corner of his mouth.  “This Griebler’s looking for an advertising manager.  He’s as pig-headed as a—­a—­well, as a pig, I suppose.  But it’s a corking chance, youngster, and the Old Man’s just recommended you—­strong.  Now—­”

“Me—!” exploded Jock.

“Shut up!” hissed Hupp.  “Two or three years with that firm would be the making of you—­if you made good, of course.  And you could.  They want to move their factory here from St. Louis within the next few years.  Now listen.  When he talks to you, you play up the keen, alert stuff with a dash of sophistication, see?  If you can keep your mouth shut and throw a kind of a canny, I-get-you, look into your eyes, all the better.  He’s gabby enough for two.  Try a line of talk that is filled with the fire and enthusiasm of youth, combined with the good judgment and experience of middle age, and you’ve—­”

“Say, look here,” stammered Jock.  “Even if I was Warfield enough to do all that, d’you honestly think—­me an advertising manager!—­with a salary that Griebler—­”

“You nervy little shrimp, go in and win.  He’ll pay five thousand if he pays a cent.  But he wants value for money expended.  Now I’ve tipped you off.  You make your killing—­”

“Oh, McChesney!” called Bartholomew Berg, glancing round.