The Project Gutenberg eBook, Skinner's Dress Suit, by Henry Irving Dodge, Illustrated by F. Vaux Wilson

Title: Skinner's Dress Suit

Author: Henry Irving Dodge

Release Date: July 17, 2008 [eBook #26080]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SKINNER'S DRESS SUIT***

"I won't take your order unless you throw in that trout dinner"

SKINNER'S DRESS SUIT

BY

HENRY IRVING DODGE

With Illustrations

TORONTO
THOMAS ALLEN
PUBLISHER
1916

COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY THE CURTIS PUBLISHING COMPANY
COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY HENRY IRVING DODGE

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

TO
MY WIFE

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS

"I WON'T TAKE YOUR ORDER UNLESS YOU THROW IN THAT TROUT DINNER" . . . . . . Frontispiece

"IT'S COME AT LAST! SKINNER'S ASKED FOR A RAISE"

"THE GENERAL EFFECT DOESN'T SEEM RIGHT!"

"THERE," SHE CRIED, "YOU CAN CREDIT YOUR
DRESS-SUIT ACCOUNT WITH THAT!"

"MRS. SKINNER, DAUGHTER OF THE LATE ARCHIBALD RUTHERFORD,
OF HASTINGS-ON-THE-HUDSON, ACCOMPANIES HER HUSBAND"

"WHY CAN'T I GO WITH THOSE PEOPLE," SHE SNIFFLED

From Drawings by F. Vaux Wilson

SKINNER'S DRESS SUIT

CHAPTER I

SKINNER ASKS FOR A RAISE

Skinner had inhabited the ironbound enclosure labeled "CASHIER" at McLaughlin & Perkins, Inc., so long, that the messenger boys had dubbed him the "cage man." To them he had become something of a bluff. Skinner's pet abomination was cigarettes, and whenever one of these miniatures in uniform chanced to offend that way, he would turn and frown down upon the culprit. The first time he did this to Mickey, the "littlest" messenger boy of the district, who was burning the stub of a cigarette, Mickey dropped the thing in awe.

But Jimmie of the Postal said, "Don't be scared of him! He's locked up in his cage. He can't get at you!"

So the sobriquet "cage man" was evolved from this chance remark, and the wit of the thing had spread until everybody had come to think of Skinner as the "cage man"—a fact which did not add greatly to his dignity.

But on this particular morning the "cage man" was even more harmless than usual. There was n't a frown in him. He sat at his tall desk and stared abstractedly at the open pages of his cash-book. He did n't see the figures on the white page, and he paid no more heed to the messenger boys, whose presence he was made aware of by the stench of burning paper and weed, than he did to the clicking, fluttering, feminine activity in the great square room to his left, over which he was supposed to keep a supervising eye.

Skinner had stage fright! He had resolved to ask McLaughlin for a raise. Skinner was afraid of McLaughlin—not physically, for Skinner was not