Some of the men were seedy, with sunken cheeks and puffy pink
eyes--others were young; possibly still in high school. After a jostled
fifteen minutes during which they all eyed one another with apathetic
suspicion there appeared a smart young shepherd clad in a "waist-line"
suit and wearing the manner of an assistant rector who herded them
up-stairs into a large room, which resembled a school-room and contained
innumerable desks. Here the prospective salesmen sat down--and again
waited. After an interval a platform at the end of the hall was clouded
with half a dozen sober but sprightly men who, with one exception, took
seats in a semicircle facing the audience.
The exception was the man who seemed the soberest, the most sprightly
and the youngest of the lot, and who advanced to the front of the
platform. The audience scrutinized him hopefully. He was rather small
and rather pretty, with the commercial rather than the thespian sort of
prettiness. He had straight blond bushy brows and eyes that were almost
preposterously honest, and as he reached the edge of his rostrum he
seemed to throw these eyes out into the audience, simultaneously
extending his arm with two fingers outstretched.
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