It would have paid him to start an
employment agency; as it was, instead of receiving fees, he very
often supplied his friends' immediate necessities out of his own
pocket. The more he earned the more freely he bestowed, so that his
occasional strokes of luck in commerce were of no ultimate benefit
to him. No man in his Position had a larger credit; for weeks at a
time he could live without cash expenditure; but this was seldom
necessary.
By a mental freak which was characteristic of him he nursed the
thought of connecting himself with Messrs. Quodling & Son, oil and
colour merchants. Theirs was a large and sound business, both in
town and country. It might not be easy to become traveller to such a
firm, but his ingenious mind tossed and turned the possibilities of
the case, and after a day or two spent in looking up likely
men--which involved a great deal of drinking in a great variety of
public resorts--he came across an elderly traveller who had
represented Quodlings on a northern circuit, and who boasted a
certain acquaintance with Quodling the senior.
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