Part 13 (1/2)
”Well, I am glad you mentioned it,” said Tom calmly. ”Now, there won't be the least occasion for a mistake.”
”Don't insult me!”
”No, sir; I am not looking for work.”
”Eh?”
”I said I wasn't looking for work.”
”What do you mean by that?”
”That, sir, is a mystery puzzle, and there is a reward of one herring bone for the correct solution. Answers must be sent in on one side of the paper only, and have a certificate added that the sender has not got cold feet.”
At this quaint humor, some at the table laughed outright. The sour-looking individual looked thoroughly enraged.
”I--I'll settle with you another time, young man!” he roared, and dashed from the room.
”Tom, you made it rather warm for him,” remarked d.i.c.k.
”Well, he had no right to find fault with our appet.i.tes,” grumbled Tom. ”We are paying for our meals, and I am going to eat what I please.”
”And I don't blame you, young man,” said a gentleman sitting opposite.
”Sladen is very disagreeable to us all and makes himself especially obnoxious to newcomers. He imagines the hotel is here for his especial benefit.”
”Well, he wants to treat me fairly, or I'll give him as good as he sends, and better.”
During the evening Sladen made himself particularly disagreeable to the Rovers and their chums. This set Tom to thinking, and he asked one of the hotel men what business the man was in and where he usually kept himself.
”He is a traveling salesman,” was the answer. ”He sells horse and cattle medicine.”
”Oh, I see,” said Tom, and set his brain to work to play some joke on the sour-looking vender of stock remedies.
Tom's chance came sooner than expected. A batch of colored folks had drifted into the place under the impression that a certain planter was going to give them work at big wages. They were a worthless lot, the sc.u.m of other plantations, and n.o.body wanted them.
Sitting down, Tom penned the following note and got it to one of the negroes in a roundabout fas.h.i.+on:
”The man who wants you and all of the others is Sandy Sladen. He does not dare to say so here at the hotel, but all of you had better go up to him on the sly and tell him you are ready to work, and ask for a dollar in advance--that's the sign that it is all right. Do not let him put you off, as he may want to test you. This is the chance of your life.”
The communication was signed with a scrawl that might mean anything.
The negro read it and pa.s.sed it to his friends. All were mystified, but they decided that they must do as the letter said, and without loss of time.
Sladen was sitting in the reading-room of the hotel smoking a cheap cigar, when he was told a negro wished to see him.
”Very well, send him in,” he said in his loud, consequential tone.
The burly negro came in almost on tiptoes and, putting his mouth close to Sladen's ear, whispered:
”I'se ready to go to work, sah. Hadn't yo' bettah gib me a dollah, sah?”