settle with
old Step-an'-fetch-it, but don't you say a word where you got the
money,' I says. 'Don't ye let on nothin'--stretch that conscience o'
your'n if nes'sary,' I says, 'an' be pertic'ler if he asks you if Dave
Harum give ye the money you jest say, "No, he didn't." That wont be no
lie,' I says, 'because I aint _givin'_ it to ye,' I says. Wa'al, she
done as I told her. Of course Swinney suspicioned fust off that I was
mixed up in it, but she stood him off so fair an' square that he didn't
know jest what _to_ think, but his claws was cut fer a spell, anyway.

"Wa'al, things went on fer a while, till I made up my mind that I ought
to relieve Swinney of some of his anxieties about worldly bus'nis, an'
I dropped in on him one mornin' an' passed the time o' day, an' after
we'd eased up our minds on the subjects of each other's health an' such
like I says, 'You hold a morgidge on the Widder Cullom's place, don't
ye?' Of course he couldn't say nothin' but 'yes.' 'Does she keep up the
int'rist all right?' I says. 'I don't want to be pokin' my nose into
your bus'nis,' I says, 'an' don't tell me nothin' you don't want to.'
Wa'al, he knowed Dave Harum was Dave Harum, an' that he might 's well
spit it out, an' he says, 'Wa'al, she didn't pay nothin' fer a good
while, but last time she forked over the hull amount. 'But I hain't no
notion,' he says, 'that she'll come to time agin.' 'An' s'posin' she
don't,' I says, 'you'll take the prop'ty, won't ye?' 'Don't see no other
way,' he says, an' lookin' up quick, 'unless you over-bid me,' he says.
'No,' I says, 'I ain't buyin' no real estate jest now, but the thing I
come in fer,' I says, 'leavin' out the pleasure of havin' a talk with
you, was to say that I'd take that morgidge off'm your hands.'

"Wa'al, sir, he, he, he, he! Scat my ----! At that he looked at me fer a
minute with his jaw on his neck, an' then he hunched himself, 'n drawed
in his neck like a mud turtle. 'No,' he says, 'I ain't sufferin' fer the
money, an' I guess I'll keep the morgidge. It's putty near due now, but
mebbe I'll let it run a spell. I guess the secur'ty's good fer it.'
'Yes,' I says, 'I reckon you'll let it run long enough fer the widder to
pay the taxes on't once more anyhow; I guess the secur'ty's good enough
to take that resk; but how 'bout _my_ secur'ty?' I says. 'What d'you
mean?' he says. 'I mean,' says I, 'that I've got a second morgidge on
that prop'ty, an' I begin to tremble fer my secur'ty. Y