"
"Well, everybody but you has heard of old Sylvester. He's the
biggest crank on earth."
"Hum-m. Seems 's if he and I ought to know each other. . . . But
maybe he's a different kind of crank; eh?"
"He's all kinds. One of his notions is that he won't pay bills by
check, if he can possibly help it. He'll travel fifty miles to pay
money for a thing sooner than send a check for it. He had this
note--fourteen hundred dollars 'twas--comin' due at our bank to-day
and he'd sent word if we wanted the cash we must send for it 'cause
his lumbago was too bad for him to travel. I wanted to see him
anyhow, about a little matter of a political appointment up his
way, so I decided to take the car and go myself. Well, I've just
got back and I had a windy v'yage, too. And cold, don't talk!"
"Um . . . yes. . . . Get your money, did you?"
"Yes, I got it. It's in my overcoat pocket now. I thought one
spell I wasn't goin' to get it, for the old feller was mad about
some one of his cranberry buyers failin' up on him and he was as
cross-grained as a scrub oak root. He and I had a regular row over
the matter of politics I went there to see him about 'special. I
told him what he was and he told me where I could go. That's how
we parted. Then I came home."
"Hum. . . . You'd have had a warmer trip if you'd gone where he
sent you, I presume likely.
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