The next thing is for me to find a situation, and send
you and Jim up country for a long holiday in the
redwoods--for a holiday Jim has got to have."
"Jim can't take your money, Mr. Loudon," said Mamie.
"Jim?" cried I. "He's got to. Didn't I take his?"
Presently after, Jim himself arrived, and before he had
yet done mopping his brow, he was at me with the
accursed subject. "Now, Loudon," said he, "here we
are, all together, the day's work done and the evening
before us; just start in with the whole story."
"One word on business first," said I, speaking from the
lips outward, and meanwhile (in the private apartments
of my brain) trying for the thousandth time to find
some plausible arrangement of my story. "I want to
have a notion how we stand about the bankruptcy."
"O, that's ancient history," cried Jim. "We paid seven
cents, and a wonder we did as well. The receiver----"
(methought a spasm seized him at the name of this
official, and he broke off). "But it's all past and
done with, anyway; and what I want to get at is the
facts about the wreck.
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