twan't
about that I was thinkin'. Sam, how is Barzilla Small's boy, Lute,
gettin' along in Gus Howes' job at the bank?"

Captain Sam snorted disgust.

"Gettin' along!" he repeated. "He's gettin' along the way a squid
swims, and that's backwards. And, if you asked me, I'd say the
longer he stayed the further back he'd get."

"Sho! then he did turn out to be a leak instead of an able seaman,
eh?"

"A leak! Gracious king! He's like a torpedo blow-up under the
engine-room. The bank'll sink if he stays aboard another month, I
do believe. And yet," he added, with a shake of the head, "I don't
see but he'll have to stay; there ain't another available candidate
for the job in sight. I 'phoned up to Boston and some of our
friends are lookin' around up there, but so far they haven't had
any success. This war is makin' young men scarce, that is young
men that are good for much. Pretty soon it'll get so that a
healthy young feller who ain't in uniform will feel about as much
out of place as a hog in a synagogue. Yes, sir! Ho, ho!"

He laughed in huge enjoyment of his own joke. Jed stared dreamily
at the adjusting screw on the handsaw. His hands clasped his knee,
his foot was lifted from the floor and began to swing back and
forth.

"Well," queried his friend, "what have you got on your mind? Out
with it."

"Eh? . . . On my mind?"

"Yes. When I see you begin to shut yourself together in the middle
like a jackknife and start swinging that number eleven of yours I
know you're thinkin' hard about somethin' or other. What is it
this time?"

"Um . . . well . . . er . . . Sam, if you saw a chance to get a
real smart young feller in Lute's place in the bank you'd take him,
wouldn't you?"

"Would I? Would a cat eat lobster? Only show him to me, that's
all!"

"Um-hm. . . . Now of course you know I wouldn't do anything to
hurt Lute. Not for the world I wouldn't. It's only if you ARE
goin' to let him go--"

"IF I am. Either he'll have to let go or the bank will, one or
t'other. United we sink, divided one of us may float, that's the
way I look at it. Lute'll stay till we can locate somebody else to
take his job, and no longer."

"Ya-as. . . . Um-hm. . . . Well, I tell you, Sam: Don't you get
anybody else till you and I have another talk. It may be possible
that I could find you just the sort of young man you're lookin'
for."

"Eh? YOU can find me one? YOU can? What are you givin' me, Jed?