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Wish Book

Written by Gorg Huff and Paula Goodlett

Gary Jordan Burke flinched. He almost always flinched when Joyce got to screeching. It was an automatic response to her high-pitched, overly-loud voice. You'd think the woman thought everyone was deaf.

"Gary Jordan!"

"Yes, dear?"

"Go downtown and get some more paper scrap. We're nearly out."

"Yes, dear." Gary suppressed a sigh. Still, he'd best get downtown and do as Joyce wanted. If he didn't she'd get into his garage again, looking for non-glossy paper. She mostly left the glossy stuff alone, but any thin sheet of print was in danger around Joyce. Of course, so were ear drums.

Gary spent a lot of time in the garage. He almost had to, considering how crowded the house seemed. Heck, Joyce and her screech were a crowd all by themselves, but add in visits from kids, grandkids and assorted relatives—well, the place was a mad house half the time.

"A man can't hear himself think around here." It had been bad enough, back before the Ring of Fire. It had gotten three . . . no, six . . . no, twelve . . . well, a whole lot worse since then. Mom and Dad were living with them now, since they'd sold their house when they ran out of money. That was bad enough. But the worst was Aunt Muriel. Oh, Lord . . . Aunt Muriel.

The woman never, ever quit talking. Talking in the same kind of screech Joyce had. Even so, she did pay rent. Which was more than Mom and Dad did. Mom and Dad just assumed they'd be welcome until their dying days. Which they were, really. It was just that money was so damned tight. And feeding everyone wasn't getting any cheaper. And Gary really, really didn't like thinking about the property taxes and the way they were probably going to go up.

So, going out after paper scraps wasn't all that much of a chore. Well, it was, but it was worth it to get away from the screeching and protect what was left of the reading material in the house. Which, come to think of it, was mostly what people had used just before the paper scraps. He remembered old stories about the Sears and Roebuck catalog, back before it became the Sears catalog. How people would go to the outhouse and use the Wish Book twice. Now, that's recycling.

Gary froze. The Wish Book. They called it the Wish Book and everyone in America had one. Almost, anyway. Now that he was thinking along those lines, he remembered other stories told about the Wish Book; people ordering whole houses out of it and life-saving things. Teachers teaching children to read using it. Talk about advertising penetration. He'd been trying to figure a way to make some more money for a long time. And now he thought he'd found one. The big problem was that he didn't have a lot of money to put into the idea. Which meant he needed to talk to Mom and Dad. And Muriel.

****

"So, I don't see any reason to wait, Aunt Muriel. In fact, we shouldn't wait. Somebody else might beat us to the punch if we do."

Muriel watched him squirm for a few moments. It had to have been hard for him to do this. Gary Jordan was a proud man, one who'd done well by Joyce. But times were hard and getting harder, at least in this household. Too many people, not enough income to support them all. "I'll do it. And I'll get your parents to invest, too. It'd downright foolish to sit on what they got for the house, planning to leave it to you and Duncan when they croak. It'd make a lot better sense to put it into the business. Instead of the Sears and Roebuck catalog, why couldn't it be the Burke catalog? Running a mail order business out of the garage ought to work."

****

Well, that meant the garage would be lost as a quiet haven, Gary knew. But he needed to do something. So he'd have to sacrifice. Who wasn't, these days?

"First thing we need is a catalog."

Muriel shook her head. "First thing we need is some inventory. We ought to be able to buy in bulk and get a discount. And then we need an engraver, to do the pictures to go in the catalog. Then we get it printed up and sent out."

"But there are already such things," Ursula Reifsniderin said. "There are seed catalogs and catalogs of other things as well." Ursula was a refugee who had needed a place to stay. She acted as primary translator for the family as well as general help and instructor in the German language and German ways. She was still learning English, but was learning it a lot faster than they were learning German.

"You mean they already have the Sears catalog?" Gary asked.

"I don't know about this Sears. I don't know that word, but merchants have listings of their products they send out."

That got them into a discussion of what would make their catalog unique, which led to a discussion of what had made it unique in the original time line. It took some working out and some research. What they finally determined was that it was a combination of things. The Sears catalog had been a general merchandise catalog with a lot of products, which made it distinct from the more specialized catalogs. It had also been published in a time when transport had gotten much cheaper. Which made Gary and Muriel nervous, but pleased Ursula because the same thing was happening around the Ring of Fire with the new roads and the railroads getting started.

The first catalog was a simple thing. Not very big at all. Not too fancy, either.

But it was an actual book, well, booklet, bound with thread and it did work. In some ways, it worked too well. Orders poured in from as far away as Jena. More than they had the stock to fill. Which caused its own problems, including letters of apology and refunds when requested. Each of which cost them money. And some of the suppliers jacked up the price for products they had already ordered. They ended up selling some stuff at below cost because of that. In spite of all the headaches, they made a profit that first year. Not as large a profit as they'd have liked, but still a profit.

Muriel kept the books. The woman was a whiz with numbers and she had all day free, unlike Gary and Joyce. They kept their day jobs. Had to keep body and soul, together, after all. Mom and Dad helped, too. Most of their inventory was small stuff, so no one had any trouble lifting the various items and packing them up.

The hardest part of it all was reading the handwriting on the orders. Ursula Reifsniderin was a treasure. She was the one who took the packed up orders to the post, using the red wagon that had been around since the kids were little.

****

Ursula looked in the mirror and grimaced. She wasn't fond of her face. She had survived some rough times in her life and they had left marks. Grantville had been her salvation and the Burkes her blessing. She remembered a line, she couldn't remember where she had read it or heard it, but when she thought of Burkes it always came to mind, "Who is your family? The ones who put you out or the ones who took you in?" The Burkes were her family now and the Ring of Fire her fatherland. In general, it was a good family and a good fatherland.

She abandoned the fruitless examination of the mirror and set to work. They needed a bigger cart than the little red wagon.

****

"Look, Papa."

Johan stopped what he was doing and straightened up, grabbing at his back when he felt a twinge. "Yes, Anna? What is it now? And have you finished your chores? Picked up the bread, as your mother asked?"

Papa's back hurt a lot. Anna repressed some concern about that. It did tend to make him a bit irritable. "Papa, look at this. A man dropped a whole stack of them in the village. I've been reading it. It says here that you can order all these things from Grantville. I think Mama would love one of these." Anna pointed to the drawing.

Her papa grunted and took the book. He began flipping through it. The words "Pain Relief" caught his attention. "Dr. Gribbleflotz' Little Blue Pills of Happiness. Says here they're good for all matter of ache and pain."

"The little box is pretty, too." Anna hesitated. "It couldn't hurt to try them, could it?"

"Perhaps not. And you're right. Your mama would like that."

****

"I don't believe it for a minute," Hans said. "All of it is too cheap. It must be a scam."

"It came from Grantville," Freidrich pointed out. "And Pastor Schultz says they do things differently there. He's even been there."

"The whole village knows that." Hans' voice was full of scorn. "Like you could not know that, the way the man talks about it." He flipped another page. "Hm. Ursel would like that."

****

"Mama, Mama!"

Adele flinched at the shrill shout. Children. You just can't keep them quiet. "Shh, child, shh. Not so loud please. What is it?"

"It was so exciting, Mama. An up-timer came through the village. In one of their pick-up trucks. And he had a box of these. Then he gave me one. Look."

Adele shook her head even as she reached for the pamphlet her son held out. "Child, child, child. Your curiosity is going to get you in all sorts of trouble one of these days." She began flipping through the pages, looking at the drawings. "Oh. Papa would like one of those, don't you think?"

****

"What about the 1633 catalog?" Joyce asked. She and Gary were in bed watching TV, just like before the Ring of Fire. Of course, the movies were all reruns and the news was about broken armies, new business, and, of course, the weather and what the little ice age meant to their future.

"What about it?" Gary mumbled, not really paying attention. She could tell. Sometimes it seemed the only way she could get his attention was to screech.

This time she used an elbow to the ribs. "How are we going to handle it? Last year we bought the stuff in advance and ran out a lot. We need a better system."

"Oww. What sort of better system?"

"I don't know, but we have to come up with something. I'm not sending out any more 'Sorry, but that product is out of stock' letters if I can avoid it." She gave him a look. "Aside from what it does to our profits, it hurts our reputation."

****

"Joycie is dead right about that," Pop Burke said. He always had been pretty partial to Joyce. "We took their money, then we had to give it back. It cost us to do that. What we really need is a way to do Collect on Delivery, like they did back in the old days. Didn't do that much anymore, not even up-time. Everyone was using credit cards and checks."

"I don't know if we can work that part out," Gary admitted. "Maybe we can. What we'll have to do, though . . . I think, maybe . . . is get the suppliers more involved, get them to give us better discounts for one thing. Freight costs . . . man alive, those are terrible. But we need guaranteed stock, no more of this 'oh, we're out of that.' And, considering how well we did do, I think a bigger, better catalog will help a lot."

Muriel nodded. "That last one was pretty plain. I bet it got lost in the mail half the time. We need a better cover, something that stands out. Color if we could get it."

"Whoo hee." Pop chuckled. "And pretty girls modeling underwear?"

Mom swatted his arm. "You old coot."

"Hey!" Pop rubbed his arm. "I don't see why not. They did that, even back in the old days."

"I don't see why there shouldn't be pretty girls. And good-looking guys, for that matter," Joyce said. "Whatever it takes to sell stuff. And we've got some good products. Life-saving products, even, now that they've figured out the household fire extinguisher. Adolph Schmidt's gold-plated flatware ought to sell like hotcakes, too. We ought to be able to double the pages this time."

****

"Me? To model?" Ursula's hand flew to her face. "Oh, no. Not me."

"Herr Gruber will leave that out, Ursula." Joyce smiled. "Back up-time they airbrushed out all sorts of defects. I mean, you'll never convince me that they didn't airbrush the Playboy bunnies right, left, up-side-down and sideways. You're the right size and the right build. We'll put your hair up pretty and get you a real nice outfit. That won't matter."

"But . . ."

"It's keep it in the family, or we have to hire someone else. And the more we can keep it in the family, the more money we get to keep."

Ursula reluctantly agreed. Joyce had the right of it there, as much as she hated to admit it.

****

"I'm sorry, Herr Kruger. But unless you can guarantee a supply of your vise grips at a consistent price, they won't be in the Wish Book this year." Gary Jordan Burke was learning to play hard ball, or at least he was trying. Herr Kruger was one of the people who had jacked up prices last year, which left them selling his product for less than they paid for it. It hadn't been entirely his fault; he had had to put on extra people to fulfill the demand. On the other hand, he wasn't the one that had taken the loss.

"But you won't guarantee to buy them. That is hardly fair."

"You're right. But having your product in our book is very good advertising." Gary shrugged. "It's your choice."

****

"No, Herr Schmidt, it's not about the flatware." Joyce smiled at the rather beefy down-timer. "We would like to include the Higgins Sewing Machine in our Wish Book. The way it would work is we would forward orders received to you, then receive a commission on sales you made through our Book."

"How much of a commission were you thinking about?" It went on from there and took several weeks to work out all the details. Of course, Gary and Joyce were working out the same issues on other products at the same time. It depended on the product and the company as to how things worked. Sometimes they bought stock outright, sometimes they acted as agent for other companies. Sometimes their agreements were exclusive, sometimes not.

****

"Oh, I really like this section." Muriel flipped through the pages of the 1633 Burke catalog. "That was clever, naming each section that way."

"Working Man Blues for the overalls is cute, I suppose." Mom sniffed. "But I'm not at all sure about that Mail-Order Bride section."

Pop cackled. "Keep your wife as happy as a new bride." Then he snorted. "But that sure didn't work the time I bought you a new vacuum, if I remember right."

Mom threw him a look. "You old coot. That was our twentieth wedding anniversary. You coulda made some kind of effort."

****

"Mail-Order Bride?" The caption brought Paulus Sandler to a brief halt, then he saw the rest of it. "Keep your wife as happy as a new bride. Ha! As though that can happen." He started to toss the book back on the table, then caught sight of the cover. "Hmm."

He looked at it again, then flipped through it a bit more. "Hmm." He looked at the cover again.

"See something you like?" Albrecht Pfister asked. The other men around the table laughed. Paulus looked over at Albrecht, who was suppressing a grin and not doing a good job of it. Paulus had been a widower for two years now. His partners had each tried to find him a new wife amongst their relatives, but Paulus wasn't impressed with the results. He knew they wanted him to remarry. He even realized that they probably had a point. Maria had been the joy of his life. He still felt it when he thought of her and probably always would. He looked back at the book and Albrecht spoke again. "Think you ought to send off for that one, do you?"

"They're not selling the woman, you idiots. They're selling the things she shows. You know that as well as I do. Besides, I doubt she's real. Or, if real, I doubt she looks like that."

"Dare you to write and find out." Albrecht took a sip of beer. "You never know. It came from that Grantville place. I hear they're strange there."

That put a slight damper on the conversation. Everyone had heard they were strange there and more. By now everyone had met several people who had visited the place and seen the wonders. What they were concerned about was how those wonders would effect them. Paulus and his partners were in the shipping business. They owned, between them, half a dozen barges, and owned or had a agreements with dozens of inns and mule teams for the shipment and storage of goods. They had heard of the railroads but they were far away . . . at least for now.

****

The drawing of the woman was a topic of conversation time and time again. After a week, Paulus gave up. "All right, all right. I'll write the letter and order the woman. But you know she isn't real."

Paulus knew she wasn't real. He knew this wouldn't happen, that he wouldn't receive a bride in the mail. But she sure was pretty. Perhaps, if she was real, just maybe she would write to him. But she wouldn't be real, not looking like that. It was impossible. Real women didn't look like that.

****

"Because I can order it cheaper than we can go there." Johan Weisel shook his head. "To travel to Grantville would be too expensive. To order this, even with the freight charges, I can afford."

Barbara Weisel hid a smile. She'd been pretty sure that was the right approach. First she'd started by asking that they make the trip to Grantville and see the sights. She'd known all along that wouldn't happen. But enough display of unhappiness had gotten her what she really wanted. She would be the first woman in the village to have gold-plated flatware. Wouldn't Maria be envious?

****

The Gerber Bargain Book came out about three months after the 1633 Burke Wish Book. Gerber had copied their idea and there was absolutely nothing they could do about it. A lot of their nonexclusive suppliers had their ads directly copied in his book.

No one was sure how he had gotten the print plates. Perhaps he hadn't; perhaps all he had done was use their book as a model. That's what Herr Gruber, the engraver, insisted. There were, he said, little differences in the Gerber book and the Wish Book. They actually talked to a lawyer about suing Gerber, but the lawyer told them it probably wouldn't do any good because the guy was based in Halle. Even if they won, the suit was likely to cost more than it would gain them. No one was sure what it would do to sales but they were all worried.

****

Johan groaned and stretched. "My pills, dear. Please."

Barbara nodded. She was happy that Johan had discovered the Blue Pills of Happiness. He was much less grumpy these days. She had used them a time or two herself, when the monthly cramps got out of hand.

All in all, she thought that many people in the village were a good bit less grumpy these days. Even her mother, who took the pills for the constant toothaches she suffered. "It's getting to be time to order more. But I think we should try the ones from the Bargain Book. They're cheaper."

"I'd be afraid they wouldn't work as well. Let's stick to the Gribbleflotz brand . . . just in case."

"Those are in the Bargain Book, too."

"But we know the ones from the Wish Book work."

Barbara shrugged. "As you wish. And your trousers are worn to the weft again. How about you try a pair of torberts?"

****

Ursula sighed. There were order forms in the Wish Book which made it easier to tell what was being ordered, in spite of which a lot of people put their orders in letters. People just didn't follow instructions. Still she had a job to do. She opened the letter and quickly realized that there was, in this case, a good reason for not using the order form.

Dear Sirs,

I would have used the order form but the item that captured my interest possessed neither order number or price. This is entirely understandable, for the young lady displayed on the cover and in your Mail Order Bride Section is clearly a pearl beyond price. Capture my interest, did I say? Nay, more. The kindly sparkle of her eyes, the clever wit of her smile, hold me an entranced prisoner even now.

I am not a fool, good sirs, though I know I must sound one. Such a one cannot exist in our poor earthly world. Not unless an angel from heaven snuck to earth in the fabled Ring of Fire. No, it must be the work of a latter day Michelangelo or Leonardo Da Vinci, who has, in turning from uncouth men to lovely ladies, put Michelangelo's David to blushing shame. And in his model found a smile that causes the famed Mona Lisa to raise her hand to hide the smile that, until now, men so remarked upon.

Still, even the greatest artist must needs have inspiration to work from. And the inspiration for these works of art must have been more than a mere physical model. Clearly the artist has managed to capture a bit of the beauty of the model's soul. Nor, I know, can such a thing be bought. It must instead be won. Did I but live in an earlier age, I would don armor and seek out a dragon to slay or perhaps take up my lute and compose ballads by the score.

But we do not live in such times and my singing causes children to flee in fear, convinced, no doubt, that some horrible monster approaches. I am but a man of accounts. A merchant, who even now kicks himself for not having the wit to offer my customers such a compilation of products to be ordered with such ease. So, while I would willingly and happily order all of the items in the Mail Order Bride section of your Wish Book—did I have such a bride as the one you show to gift them with. Alas, the one that would make the others worthwhile is unavailable. But, on the infinitesimal chance that I am wrong . . . that there is such a paragon of the womanly virtues as the pictures display . . . How might she be contacted?

Yours Most Sincerely,

Paulus Sandler

Ursula sat frozen in her chair, staring at the letter, unsure whether to laugh or cry. Clearly the letter was intended to offer the writer up for friendly ridicule for the amusement of the reader. But she was sure that there was a touch of genuine desire hidden in its lines. There was a loneliness in it that she recognized as her own. A loneliness that didn't really expect to find easing. It was that realization that tipped the balance in favor of tears, for she could almost—but not quite—believe that she could ease that loneliness and her own into the bargain. And the certainty that she couldn't weighed on her with a weight she couldn't bear. Tears filled her eyes, a little for the letter but mostly for the knowledge that she would live and die alone. Leaving the letter where it lay, she got up and ran from the room.

****

"What was that all about?" Gary asked.

Joyce was quicker. She went to Ursula's desk and looked for what some cretin could have written that would upset the normally unflappable young woman to the point of tears. Ready to give the cretin a piece of her mind, she of course saw the letter immediately. And began to read. Gary shortly was reading over her shoulder.

"What's the big deal?" Gary asked, just like a man. "So the guy was over the top. Why not just trash it if she didn't want to answer it."

Joyce slammed him with an elbow to the ribs. "Don't be more of a jerk than you have to, Gary. The problem is she does want to answer it."

Gary stepped out of range because he knew he was about to earn another elbow. "So why not answer it?"

Joyce didn't answer, she just looked at him and sighed. "Stay here. And don't say a word about this to Ursula. Ever! I'm going to talk to her."

****

Ursula was crying in her pillow when she heard the knocking and realized that she had run out of the room. Embarrassment fought grief and won, at least for the moment. She wiped her eyes and went to open the door. When she saw the letter in Joyce's hand, a new embarrassment added its weight to grief and the tears came again.

"I knew I shouldn't have agreed. I knew it."

"Honey, it's a beautiful letter. It's kind of like the man really wants to know you. He sounds very sweet." Joyce pointed to the phrase "children run screaming in fear." "You've got to like a guy who can put himself down like that."

Ursula blinked back tears. "And now I have to tell this perfectly nice man that I am not what he thinks. I knew Herr Gruber was doing wrong, making me too pretty. No one has ever offered me marriage. My family didn't even want to look at me, not after. . . . Mama cried every time she looked at my face. That is why I left. I could bear it no longer."

Joyce patted her shoulder. "You are too that pretty. Why, if we were back up-time, they could fix that in a heartbeat."

"But we are not." Ursula stood, then wiped her eyes. "We are not."

****

Dear Sir,

I regret that I must decline your kind offer. It is quite true that nothing was added to that drawing, that I will attest to. But I'm afraid something was left out of it. I feel that it would not be to your advantage, or mine, to correspond.

I thank you for the letter you sent and will treasure it.

U.R.

Ursula considered and worked on her response for a week. Even though Joyce had offered to write it, she felt that she must. After at least fifty starts and stops, she finally decided that short and simple was best. But she couldn't resist letting Paulus Sandler know that she did treasure his letter.

****

"She writes a beautiful hand," Albrecht pointed out. "I wonder what she means, 'something was left out of it.'"

"Pox marks, I'd bet."

"Fat as a house, maybe?"

"No teeth?"

Paulus read the letter again. Something about it spoke to him. But he didn't know what. "I suppose we'll never know. I told you there would be something like this." Even as he blustered, he tried to hide his disappointment.

"Business is slow," Albrecht said. "You could go see. Don't even have to give your name. Just go and look."

"Bah! Pointless."

"Well, there's always my niece, Anna."

Paulus flinched. Anna was, in his opinion, a shrew and as close to witless as he had ever seen.

"Then you ought to go. Every man should travel now and again." Here, fishy, fishy.

"Pointless, I say."

"Dare you. Besides, we need someone to have a look at those railroads and see if we can get shipping contracts from Grantville. We got some from that Simpson fellow in Magdeburg."

"We don't have much in the way of connections in southern Germany. We always thought they weren't needed."

"True enough, before the Ring of Fire happened. Now I'm not so sure. It's been a couple of years and they're still there. Even getting bigger. I really do think it's time we started paying attention, don't you?"

****

The suppliers, some of them, were doing it again, in spite of the contracts. "Unavoidable delays." "We're sorry, but there are just so many hours in a day and we're working our fingers to the bone as it is." It was even true. Of course, some of the stuff they were working their fingers to the bone making was going to Halle to the Gerber warehouse. Gerber's advantage was that he had more startup money. He could make bulk orders, put them in his warehouse in Halle and have them ready for the orders to come in.

"I'm getting worried about this," Joyce said. "This is the fifth 'out of stock' letter I've had to write this week. If this keeps up, it's going to ruin our reputation."

"It's going to ruin us entirely. Waiting for those products is costing us money. And we're still getting orders from last year's Wish Book at last year's prices." Muriel was getting worried. When they had decided to seriously expand the Wish Book for 1633, they had put up the house as collateral for a large loan. They had gone with a truly monstrous print run, fifteen thousand copies and hired extra people. All of which would have been fine if they had or could get enough product to support their orders.

At seven months after the publication of the 1633 Wish books they had filled sixty-three thousand orders and had just under twenty thousand waiting, at an average of three point seven items per order. Mostly small ticket items: measuring cups and spoons, scales, even fabric tape measures, were selling faster than they could be produced. So they had a fair-sized staff that was mostly sitting on its hands waiting for the manufacturers to deliver the product so that they could package it and ship it. And they couldn't let their people go; they had become like family. Instead, she had missed the last two payments on the house. The worry was affecting her temper, which was none too even to begin with.

****

Paulus Sandler couldn't quite believe what he was seeing. The Wish Book came from here? A small, inconspicuous building, off the main streets of Grantville? There was no warehouse. There was barely room for a person to turn around in the crowded space. How could this possibly be the headquarters of the Wish Book?

He stopped staring in the window, squared his shoulders and tapped at the door. In the few hours he'd been here, he'd already learned to call this kind of building a "garage." It appeared that many of these garages had been converted to living spaces or workshops for various manufactories.

"Come in!"

Paulus flinched. The voice was very high-pitched and screechy. Perhaps that was what U.R. meant when she said that something had been left out. He cracked open the door. "Hello?"

"Come on in. I'm in the back."

Paulus made his way around a stack of barrels. "Ah?"

"What can I help you with?" The woman who spoke was very old, but her eyes behind the thick spectacles were bright. "Were you looking for Gary or Joyce?"

"Ah . . . no." Paulus held out the letter he had received. "I am looking for the person who wrote this."

Muriel looked at the letter. She knew all about it, of course. You couldn't keep a secret in the Burke household. "You the man that wrote?" He wasn't a bad looking man, she thought. A bit beefy, maybe, but nice looking.

"Yes. And I could not help myself. I must know what got left out of the picture. I simply must."

Muriel picked up a copy of the Wish Book and pointed to the cover. Then, with a finger nail, she indicated a scar on the beautiful face. "Ursula has a scar here. A bad one, caused by one of the men who attacked her. But that isn't the worst scar she carries. The worst one is the scar she carries in her heart."

"Ah." Paulus stopped.

"So tell me, buster. Does that change things for you? She's not quite what the picture shows. But she's really a lot more than it shows, too. I've never met a more caring person, up-time or down. And as they say, beauty is only skin deep."

"How am I supposed to know that?" Paulus complained. "I have never met the woman. I don't know how things would go between us even if she looked exactly like the picture. What's she like? Will she find me an old, fat man?" Paulus wasn't fat but he was solidly built and not overly tall. Nor was he a doddering oldster, though there was some gray in his blond hair and lines of care on his face. He looked like what he was, a middle-aged, fairly prosperous merchant. But he knew that to the callow youth he had been, he would look an old man. "Does her smile in the picture there reflect her laugh or is it the artist's grace? Does she laugh with joy or at another's pain?"

He shook head unable to really explain what had brought him here "It's true that I came about the girl, but I knew it was probably a fool's errand even as I made the trip. I have no desire to hurt the girl nor any great desire to be hurt myself. The excuse I gave myself was that I was really coming to look over your business. Perhaps it's best we leave it at that for now?"

"Oh no! Gerber's already killing us. Now you want to jump in."

Paulus laughed. "Not necessarily. It's more curiosity than anything else. Is Gerber really hurting you that much? From what I hear back home, you seem to have plenty of customers."

"That's not the problem. It's the suppliers." And from ...