"I bet that Mary would handle the mail, that's all. So she will; fact is, she's handlin' it now. She's my a.s.sistant in the post-office here.

If you don't believe it, go back to the mail window and look in. No, Major, _I_ win the bet."

Maybe I did, but he wouldn't pay it. He vowed I was a low down swindler and a "welsher," whatever that is. He blew out of that store like a toy typhoon and I didn't see him again until the next summer. However, I had a feelin' that Major Cobden Clark wa'n't the wust friend I had, by a consider'ble sight.

You see, that was Jim Henry's great scheme-to hire Mary to run the office as my a.s.sistant. He didn't say what salary I was to pay her, and, if I chose to hand over three-quarters of the postmaster's pay to her, what business was it of his? I told him that plain, and, to do him justice, he didn't seem to care.

But he did rub it in about my declarin' I'd never go into politics.

In a little while the mail department was as much a part of the "Ostable Grocery, Dry Goods, Boots and Shoes and Fancy Goods Store" as the calico and dress goods counter. We bought the Blaisdell letter-box rack and fixin's and set 'em up and they done fust-rate for the time bein'. I was postmaster, so fur as name goes, but 'twas Mary that really run that end of the ship. It seemed as natural to have her come in mornin's, as it did for the sun to rise; and, if she was late, which didn't happen often, it seemed almost as if the sun hadn't rose. The old store needed somethin' like her to keep it clean and sweet and even Jim Henry give in that she was the best investment the business had made yet.

As for business it kept on good, even though the summer folks had gone and winter had set in. Our order carts kept runnin' and they _took_ orders, too. The store was doin' well by us both and I certainly owed old Pullet a debt of thanks for workin' on my sympathies until I put my cash into it. There was consider'ble buildin' goin' on in town and, when spring begun to show symptoms of makin' Ostable harbor, Jim Henry got possessed of a new idea. I didn't pay much attention at fust. He was always as full of notions as a peddler's cart and if I took every one of 'em serious we'd either been Rockefellers or star boarders at the poorhouse, one or t'other. 'Twa'n't till that day in April when old Ebenezer Taylor came in after his mail and went out after the constable that I realized somethin' had to be done.

You see, Ebenezer's eyes was failin' on him and, to make things worse, he'd forgot his nigh-to specs and had on his far-off pair. Consequently, when he headed for the after end of the store, he wa'n't in no condition to keep clear of the rocks and shoals in the channel. Fust thing he run into was a couple of dress-forms with some bargain calico gowns on 'em.

While he was beggin' pardon of them forms, under the impression that they was women customers, he backed into a roll of barbed wire fencin'

that was leanin' against the candy and cigar counter. His clothes was sort of thin and if that barbed wire had been somebody tryin' to borrer a quarter of him he couldn't have jumped higher or been more emphatic in his remarks. The third jump landed him against the gunwale of a bushel basket of eggs that Jacobs was makin' a special run on and had set out prominent in the aisle. Maybe Ebenezer was tired from the jumpin' or maybe the excitement had gone to his head and he thought he was a hen.

Anyhow he set on them eggs, and in two shakes of a heifer's tail he was the messiest lookin' omelet ever I see. Jacobs and me and the clerk sc.r.a.ped him off best we could with pieces of barrel hoop and the cheese knife, and Mary come out from behind the letter boxes and helped along with the floor mop, but when we'd finished with him he was consider'ble more like somethin' for breakfast than he was human.

And mad! An April fool chocolate cream couldn't have been more peppery than he was. He distributed his commentaries around pretty general-Mary got some and so did Jacobs-but the heft was fired at me. He hated me anyhow, 'count of my bein' made postmaster and for some other reasons.

"You-you thunderin' murderer!" he hollered, shakin' his old fist in my face. "'Twas all your fault. You done it a-purpose. Look at me! Look! my legs punched full of holes like a skimmer, and-and my clothes! Just look at my clothes! A whole suit ruined! A suit I paid ten dollars and a half for-"

"Ten year and a half ago," I put in, involuntary, as you might say.

"It's a lie. 'Twon't be nine year till next September. You think you're funny, don't you? Ever since this consarned, robbin' Black Republican administration made you postmaster! Postmaster! You're a healthy postmaster! I'll have you arrested! I'll march straight out and have you took up. I will!"

He headed for the door. I didn't say nothin'. I was sorry about the clothes and I'd have paid for 'em willin'ly, but arguin' just then was a waste of time, as the feller said when the deef and dumb man caught him stealin' apples. Ebenezer stamped as fur as the door and then turned around.

"I may not have you took up," he says; "but I'll get even with you, Zeb Snow, yet. You wait."

After he'd gone and we'd made the place look a little less like an egg-nog, I took Jim Henry by the sleeve and led him into the back room where we could be alone. Even there the surroundin's was so cluttered up with goods and bales and boxes that we had to stand edgeways and talk out of the sides of our mouths.

"Jim," says I, "this place of ours ain't big enough. We've got to have more room."

He pretended to be dreadful surprised.

"Why, why, Skipper!" he says. "You shock me. This is so sudden. What put such an idea as that in your head? Seems to me I have a vague remembrance of handin' you that suggestion no less than twenty-five times since the last change of the moon, but I hope _that_ didn't influence you."

"Aw, dry up," says I. "You was right. Let it go at that. Afore I got the postmastership this buildin' was big enough. Now it ain't. We've got to build on or move or somethin'. Have you got any definite plan?"

He smiled, superior and top-lofty, and reached over to pat me on the back; but reachin' in that crowded junk-shop was bad judgment, 'cause his elbow hit against the corner of a tea chest and his next set of remarks was as explosive and fiery as a box of ship rockets.

"Never mind the blessin'," I says. "Go ahead with the fust course. Have you got anything up your sleeve? anything besides that b.u.mp, I mean."

Well, it seems he had. Seems he'd thought it all out. We'd ought to buy Philander Foster's buildin', which was on the next lot to ours, move it close up, cut doors through, and use it for the post-office department.

"Humph!" says I, after I'd turned the notion over in my mind. "That ain't so bad, considerin' where it come from. I can only sight one possible objection in the offin'."

"What's that, you confounded Jezebel?" he says.

"Jezebel?" says I. "What on airth do you call me that for?"

"'Cause you're him all over," he says. "He was the feller I used to hear about in Sunday School, the prophet chap that was always croakin' and believed everything was goin' to the dogs. That was Jezebel, wasn't it?"

"No," says I, "that was Jeremiah; Jezebel was the one the dogs _went_ to. And she was a woman, at that."

"Well, all right," he says. "Whatever he or she was they didn't have anything on you when it comes to croaks. What's the objection?"

"Nothin' much. Only I don't know's you've happened to think that Philander might not care to sell his buildin', to us or to anybody else."

That was all right. We could go and see, couldn't we? Well, we could of course-and we did.

CHAPTER V-A TRAP AND WHAT THE "RAT" CAUGHT IN IT

Foster run a shebang that was labeled "The Palace Billiard, Pool and Sipio Parlors. Cigars and Tobacco. Tonics, all Flavors. Ice Cream in Season." The "Palace" part was some exaggeration and so was the "Parlors," but the place was the favorite hang-out of all the loafers and young sports in town and the church folks was tumble down on it, callin' it a "gilded h.e.l.l" and such pious profanity. The gilt had wore off years afore and if the hot place ain't more interestin' than that billiard saloon it must be dull for some of the permanent boarders.

We found Philander asleep back of the soft drink counter and young Erastus Taylor-"Ratty," everybody called him-practicin' pin pool, as usual, at one of the tables. "Ratty" was Ebenezer Taylor's only son and the combination trial and idol of the old man's soul. Ebenezer thought most as much of him as he did of his money, and when you've said that you couldn't make it any stronger. He'd done a heap to make a man of "Rat"-his idea of a man-even separatin' from enough cash to send him to a business college up to Middleboro; but all the boy got from that college was a thunder and lightnin' taste in clothes and a post-graduate course in pool playin'. Pool playin' was the only thing he cared about and he could spot any one of the Ostable sharps four b.a.l.l.s and beat 'em hands down. He'd sampled two or three jobs up to Boston, but they always undermined his health and he drifted back home to live on dad and look for another "openin'." I cal'late the pair lived a cat and dog life, for Ratty always wanted money to spend and Ebenezer wanted it to keep. The old man was the wust down on the billiard room of anybody and his son put in most of his time there.

Me and Jim Henry woke up Philander and told him we wanted to talk with him private. He said go ahead and talk; there wa'n't anybody to hear but Ratty, and Rat was just like one of the family. So, as we couldn't do it any different, we went ahead. Jacobs explained that we felt that maybe we might some time or other need a little extry room for our business and, bein' as he-Philander-was handy by and we was always prejudiced in favor of a neighbor and so on, perhaps he'd consider sellin' us his buildin' and lot. Course it didn't make so much difference to him; he could easy move his "Parlors" somewheres else-and similar sweet ile.

Philander listened till Jim Henry had poured on the last soothin' drop, and then he laughed.

"Um ... ya-as," he says. "I could move a heap, _I_ could! I'm so durned popular amongst the good landholders in this town that any one of 'em would turn their best settin'-rooms over to me the minute I mentioned it. Yes, indeed! Just where 'bouts would I move?-if 'tain't too much to ask."

Well, that was some of a sticker, 'cause _I_ couldn't think of anybody that would have that billiard room within a thousand fathoms of their premises, if they could help it. But Jim Henry he pretended not to be shook up a cent's wuth. That was easy; 'twas just a matter of Philander's pickin' out the right place, that was all there was to it.

Philander heard him through and then he laughed again.

"You're wastin' good business breath," he says. "I wouldn't sell if I could, unless I had a fust-cla.s.s place to move into, and there ain't no such place on the main road and you know it. I'm doin' trade enough to keep me alive and I'm satisfied, though I can't lay up a cent. But, so fur as movin' out is concerned, I expect to do that on the fust of next November. I'll be fired out, I judge, and prob'ly'll have to leave town.

Hey, Rat?"

Ratty Taylor, who'd been listenin', twisted his mouth and grunted.

"Yes," he says, "I guess that's right, worse luck!"

"You bet it's right!" says Philander. "As I said, Mr. Jacobs, if I could sell out to you and Cap'n Zeb I wouldn't, without a good handy place to move into. And I can't sell any way. There's a thousand dollar mortgage on this shop and lot; it's due June fust; and, unless I pay it off-which I can't, havin' not more'n five hundred to my name-the mortgage'll be foreclosed and out I go."

This was news all right. Then me and Jim Henry asked the same question, both speakin' together.

"Who owns the mortgage?" we asked.

Foster looked at Ratty and grinned. Rat grinned back, sort of sickly.

"Shall I tell 'em?" says Philander.

"I don't care," says Ratty. "Tell 'em, if you want to."