Part 11 (1/2)

”Yes,” said Eliph'. ”Somebody's home, but they don't answer the bell.

”Book agent?” said the attorney. ”Well, you can't blame them, much. Gems of literature aren't always wanted.”

The Colonel scowled. He felt a personal interest in Pap Briggs' money, and he resented any attempt to part the old man from any of it. He suffered almost as deeply at tax time as Pap himself did, and he considered the money Sally had to pay in installments on Sir Walter Scott as practically thrown away, and that she might as well have taken it out of his own pocket. He knocked on the lower step of the porch, with the side of his ax, angrily.

”You git out of this here yard!” he ordered. ”I don't want no book agents a-hangin' around here, an' I won't have it. You clean out of here!”

Eliph' coughed lightly behind his hand, but the words of reproof that he intended to launch softly at the Colonel were never spoken.

”Well, this IS lucky!” cried the attorney, holding out his hand to Eliph'. ”Colonel, this is the best luck we could have had. Here we need a witness, and here we have him right on the spot! I was going to stop and get Skinner on the way down, and then I thought maybe, from what you said, you and Skinner were not very friendly, so I didn't, and now I'm glad I didn't. We find a witness right here on the porch, just as if he had been ordered to be here. I call that a good omen.”

The Colonel was not pleased, and he showed it, but he really had nothing that he could urge against this book agent, so he said nothing. The attorney rang the bell, and Miss Sally, having peeped out to see the meaning of so many men on her porch, recognized the Colonel and the attorney, and opened the door. The attorney stood back to let Eliph'

enter, and then followed him in. The three men stood in the little hallway, hats in hand, while Toole explained why they had come, and Miss Sally led the way to the second-floor room where the box stood.

It was an impressive scene as the four gathered around the box.

”Knock off the lid!” said the attorney firmly. The Colonel raised his ax and struck. The board splintered but remained firm. ”Legally,” said the attorney, ”you may strike three blows.”

At the third blow a portion of the lid fell clattering to the floor, and the three men and Miss Sally peered anxiously into the box. From it the Colonel tenderly lifted a nickel-plated cylinder, as tall as a man's knee and as large around as a leg of mutton. It had a convex top, and on one side a dial. From near the base a long rubber tube extended.

The Colonel handled the thing gently. He held it in his hands as an old bachelor might handle his newborn nephew, and Miss Sally looked anxiously into his face, appealing for enlightenment. The Colonel studied the thing carefully, and then looked into the box again, and back at the glittering object in his hands. There were three more exactly like it in the box.

”What is it?” asked Miss Sally nervously. It looked explosive.

The gingerly manner in which the Colonel handled the dangerous-looking thing aroused her suspicions. She backed away from it. Eliph' Hewlitt opened his lips to speak, but the attorney motioned him to be still.

”Don't you know what it is?” Miss Sally asked, appealing to the Colonel.

”Yes,” said the Colonel, but he still looked at the glistening affair with doubt. ”Oh, yes! But I can't see what that there young feller was doin' with four of 'em. I can't see what he was doin' with 'em anyhow.

Mebby,” he said, ”he was agent for 'em.”

”He was agent for 'most everything I ever heard tell of a man bein'

agent for,” said Miss Sally, ”but I wish you'd tell me what they are.”

”Well, ma'm,” said the Colonel, ”this is fire-extinguishers; patent chemical fire-extinguishers. I know because I recall seein' some once when I was down to Jefferson. They had 'em in a theater there. They put out fires with 'em.”

”Well!” exclaimed Miss Sally. ”How do you ever suppose anybody would put out a fire with a thing like that?”

The Colonel turned the affair over and over.

”I didn't study that up,” he admitted, ”but I guess if I take time I can find out how the thing works. They squirt out of this here tube somehow.”

He turned up the end of the tube and squinted into it. Again Eliph'

Hewlitt was about to speak, but the attorney caught his eye and winked, and the little book agent held his tongue.

”Well, land's sakes!” exclaimed Miss Sally, ”What am I goin' to do with four fire-extinguishers, I'd like to know?” She asked the question as if the Colonel had got her into this thing of the owners.h.i.+p of the fire-extinguishers, and she looked to him to take the responsibility. He was quite willing to accept it.

”I've got to think that over,” he said. ”A feller can't decide right off hand what to do with four fire-extinguishers. It looks to me as if they was worth a lot more than the young feller owed you, Miss Sally. They ain't no doubt about Miss Sally havin' a right to 'em, is there, Mister Toole?”