is way had made him forget his
diseases and the doctor, and he showed signs of bein' ha'fway decent. We
loafed around and talked and dug clams to help out the pork--that is, I
dug 'em and Fatty superintended. We see no less'n three sailin' craft
go by down the bay and tried our best to signal 'em, but they didn't pay
attention--thought we was gunners or somethin', I presume likely.

"At breakfast on Saturday, Williams begun to ask questions again.

"'Sol,' says he, 'it surprised me to find that you knew what a "margin"
was. You didn't get that from anything I said. Where did you get it?'

"I leaned back on my box seat.

"'Mr. Williams,' says I, 'I cal'late I'll tell you a little story, if
you want to hear it. 'Tain't much of a yarn, as yarns go, but maybe
it'll interest you. The start of it goes back to consider'ble many year
ago, when I was poorer'n I be now, and a mighty sight younger. At that
time me and another feller, a partner of mine, had a fish weir out in
the bay here. The mackerel struck in and we done well, unusual well.
At the end of the season, not countin' what we'd spent for livin' and
expenses, we had a balance owin' us at our fish dealer's up to Boston
of five hundred dollars--two fifty apiece. My partner was goin' to
be married in the spring and was cal'latin' to use his share to buy
furniture for the new house with. So we decided we'd take a trip up
to Boston and collect the money, stick it into some savin's bank where
'twould draw interest until spring and then haul it out and use it.
'Twas about every cent we had in the world.

"'So to Boston we went, collected our money, got the address of a safe
bank and started out to find it. But on the way my partner's hat blowed
off and the bank address, which was on a slip of paper inside of it, got
lost. So we see a sign on a buildin', along with a lot of others, that
kind of suggested bankin', and so we stepped into the buildin' and went
upstairs to ask the way again.

"'The place wa'n't very big, but 'twas fixed up fancy and there was a
kind of blackboard along the end of the room where a boy was markin' up
figgers in chalk. A nice, smilin' lookin' man met us and, when we told
him what we wanted, he asked us to set down. Then, afore we knowed it
almost, we'd told him the whole story--about the five hundred and all.
The feller said to hold on a spell and he'd go along with us and show us
where the savin's bank was himself.

"'So we waited and all the