The Merry Anne. Merwin Samuel

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СКАЧАТЬ style="font-size:15px;">      “He spoke to me the other day about wanting to see you when you came in. There’s another order to come down from Spencer.”

      “Where’s that?”

      “Up in the Alpena country.”

      “Lake Huron, eh? Oh – isn’t that where you went in the spring?”

      “Yes, I’ve been there. An old fellow named Spencer runs a little one-horse mill, and he’s selling timber and shingles. And from what the Cap’n said, I don’t think he’d care if you brought along a little venture of your own. That’s the way I used to do, when I was paying for the Schmidt.”

      “How could I do that?”

      “Spencer will give you a little credit. You can stow away a few thousand feet, and clear twenty or thirty dollars. It helps along.”

      “All right, I ‘ll try it. Are you sure the old man won’t care?”

      “Oh, yes. He’s willing enough to do the square thing, so long as it keeps us feeling good and doesn’t lose him anything.”

      “Say – there’s another thing, Henry. I fired Roche, up at Manistee.”

      “Fired him?” Henry’s brows came together.

      “Yes, I had to. I had stood him as long as I could.”

      “I don’t know what the Cap’n will say about that.”

      “I’d like to know what he can say. I was in command.”

      “Yes, I know – of course you had a right to; but the thing is to keep on his good side. Suppose we go right down to the yards, and see if you can get your story in before Roche’s.”

      “What does the Cap’n care about my men, I’d like to know!”

      “Now, keep cool, Dick. Roche, you see, used to work for him, – I don’t know but what they’re related, – and it was because the Cap’n spoke to me about him that I recommended him to you when I did. And look here, Dick,” – Henry smiled as he laid a hand on his cousin’s shoulder, – “I’m a good deal older than you are, and you can take my word for it. Don’t get sour on things. Of course people will do you if they can; but it’s human nature, and you can’t change it by growling about it. You are doing well, and what you need now is to keep your eyes open and your mouth shut. Why should you want to hurry things along?”

      A flush came over Dick’s face. “There’s a reason all right enough. You see, Henry, there’s a little girl not so very many miles from here – ”

      “Oho!” thought Henry, “a little girl!” But his face was immobile, excepting a momentary curious expression that passed over it.

      “Now don’t get to thinking it’s all fixed up, because it isn’t – not yet. But you see, I’ve been thinking that when I’ve got a little something to offer – ”

      “There’s another thing you can take my word for, my boy,” said Henry, with a dry smile; “don’t get impetuous. Marrying may be all right, but it wants to be done careful.”

      Captain Stenzenberger’s lumber yard was a few miles away, at the Chicago city limits. As the two sailors left the pier to walk up to the railway station, Dick was glad to change the subject for the first one that came into his head. “What do you suppose the Foote has been doing here this week, Dick? I heard she put in Tuesday or Wednesday.”

      “Looking for Whiskey Jim, I suppose.”

      “Oh, are they on that track again?”

      “Haven’t you seen the papers?”

      “No – not for more than a week.”

      “Well, it’s quite a yarn. From what has been said, I rather guess it’s the liquor dealers that are stirring it up this time. There is a story around that he has been counterfeiting the red-seal label on their bottles. I think they’re all off the track, though. Anybody could tell ‘em that there’s no such man. Every time a case of smuggling comes up, the papers talk about ‘Whiskey Jim,’ no matter if it’s up at the straits or down on the St. Lawrence.”

      “But what’s the trouble now?”

      “Oh, they’re saying that this fellow is a rich man that has a big smuggling system with agents all around the Lakes and dealers in the cities that are in his pay, – sort of a smuggling trust.”

      “Sounds like a fairy story.”

      “That’s about what it is. The regular dealers have taken up the fight to protect their trade, and one or two of the papers in particular have put reporters on the case, and all that sort of thing. And as usual they’re announcing just what they’ve done and what they’re going to do. The old Foote is to make a tour of the Lakes, and look into every port. And if there is any Whiskey Jim, I ‘ll bet he’s somewhere over in Canada by this time, reading the papers and laughing at ‘em.” Captain Stenzenberger was seated in his swivel chair in his dingy little one-story office at the corner of the lumber yard. His broad frame was overloaded with flesh. His paunch seemed almost to rest on his thighs as he sat there, chewing an unlighted cigar in the corner of his mouth, – a corner that had been moulded around the cigar by long habit and that looked incomplete when the cigar was not there. His fat neck – the fatter for a large goitre – was wider than his cheeks, and these again were wider than his forehead, so that his head seemed to taper off from his shoulders. A cropped mustache, a tanned, wrinkled face and forehead, and bright brown eyes completed the picture. When his two captains came in, he rested his pudgy hands on the arms of his chair, readjusted his lips around the cigar, and nodded. “How are you, boys?” said he, in a husky voice. “Have a good trip?” This last remark was addressed to Dick.

      “First part was bad, but it cleared up later.”

      “Did you put right out into that storm from Manistee?”

      “Yes – you see I had the wind behind me all the way down. Got to get a new small boat, though.”

      The “Captain” did not press the subject. In return for the privilege of buying the schooner by instalments he permitted Dick to pay for the insurance, so the young man could be as reckless as he liked.

      Dick now explained that he had come to make a payment, and the transaction was accomplished.

      “Step over and have a drink, boys,” was the next formality; and the two stood aside while Stenzenberger got his unwieldy body out of the chair, put on his hat, and led the way out.

      Adjoining the lumber yard on the west was a small frame building, bearing the sign, “The Teamster’s Friend.” It had been set down here presumably to catch the trade of the market gardeners who rumbled through in the small hours of every morning. In the rear, backed up against a lumber pile, was a long shed where the teams could wait under cover while their drivers were carousing within. A second sign, painted on the end of this shed, announced that Murphy and McGlory were the proprietors of the “sample room and summer garden.” The three men entered, and seated themselves at a table. There was no one behind the bar at the moment, but soon a woman glanced in through the rear doorway.

      Stenzenberger smiled broadly on her, and winked. “How d’ do, Madge,” he said. “Can’t you СКАЧАТЬ