Biffy was a Halart Buffalo Coin Bank, the kind you buy for children or give as a gift. Actually he was a bull buffalo but he tried to play that down as he did not want to scare the customers. Also he was a little cross eyed but he thought that added to his charm.
He had been on the shelf for a while and he was the last of the buffalo banks. They had added brown piggy banks to the shelf but no more buffaloes. Each day Biffy tried to look more charming than the rest of the banks but no one bought him. He knew why too because the customers were always talking about the nick on his nose and the dings on his paint, but Biffy by his nature was a very positive bank and he knew one day one of the customers would buy him and take him home to be the change keeper of the family. But the days had turned to weeks and weeks into months and each day the sun came up and the sun went down and he sat on the shelf.
One day as Biffy sat on the shelf, trying very hard to be charming, a very strange lady picked him up. This customer was different somehow as he could read her thoughts. He knew she really liked him and so he tried his best to ooze charm. Unfortunately she sat him down with the thought she really did not have the money to spend on stuff that was not necessary. Biffy was disappointed because he knew she would be one to put her coins in him as he knew she was the kind that saved change. If he read her right she saved everything under a quarter and had the change in a Pepsi bottle at home. But Biffy as always looked on the bright side and continued to look as charming as possible.
Time passed and suddenly out of the passing customers the strange lady appeared again. She picked him up and touched the nick on his nose and touched the dings on his paint and turned him over and saw that the stopper in his bottom had been punched down inside. She sighed not because she thought him worthless but that once again she could not afford silly stuff, and she put him down again. Biffy began to look for the strange lady and sure enough about every 2 weeks the strange lady would show up and pick him up and then put him back. He read her well enough by this time that he knew that she was home sick and there was something about buffaloes that reminded her of home.
One day she did something very strange. She took him off the front of the shelf where he always sat and hid him on the back of the shelf. He was not happy about this since he had to be seen to be sold and he was already late in being sold. The lady looked around kind of guilty looking and walked away.
During the next 2 weeks one of the mangers came by and ordered the whole display moved to a different area and he was once again on the front of the self, however when it came time for the strange lady to show up she did not come. Biffy was disappointed but since he was a bank he soon forgot...
Biffy continued to look charming and to hope that someone would buy him when he suddenly saw the strange lady walk pass. She stopped as suddenly and turned back and stopped in front of the shelf. She smiled and picked him up. She turned him over and found that someone had fished his pug out and put it back in right. She stared at the price which had not changed and instead of putting him down she put him in her cart!
As he rode around the store with the strange lady he was able to catch her thoughts and found out that she had put him on the back of the shelf in hopes that he would not be sold and even maybe marked down so she could justify buying him. He also realized that when he was moved she was sad that she could not find him. That was why today she was going to buy him, nick, dings and full price, she was afraid that she would lose the opportunity of taking him home forever.
Biffy was so happy that if he had been anything but a bank he would have jumped up and down. He went through the check out, got put in a bag, then put in a car and then the next thing he knew he was out of the bag. When the lady finished putting everything away she came over and picked him up and smiled. Then she fished around her pockets and found some small change. One by one she put the coins into the bank, then she gave him a little shake and he could feel and hear the coins inside of him. Wow what a great feeling! Coins! He felt heavier already. He was now the official change holder for the house! WOW! DOUBLE WOW!! What a great feeling. The lady of the house as he now thought of his new owner sat him high on a shelf with other things that she found important but he knew because he was THE BANK OF THE HOUSE that he was truly the most important and that he must never let his lady down.
Biffy still sits on a shelf but now it is his shelf and he has coins to guard, he is VERY important now. But to the lady of the household he is still charming and funny and he brings a comfort while being away from home. That’s OK with Biffy, the Bull Buffalo Bank of the house