Aunt Jane's Nieces
There'll
easy be enough for all, with the Major's wages and my own."
"By the bye," added the Major, "if you have any money about you, which
is just possible, sir, of course, you'd better turn it over to Patsy
to keep, and let her make you an allowance. That's the way I do--it's
very satisfactory."
"The Major's extravagant," exclaimed Patsy; "and if he has money he
wants to treat every man he meets."
Uncle John shook his head, reproachfully, at the Major.
"A very bad habit, sir," he said.
"I acknowledge it, Mr. Merrick," responded the Major. "But Patsy is
fast curing me. And, after all, it's a wicked city to be carrying a
fat pocketbook around in, as I've often observed."
"My pocketbook is not exactly fat," remarked Uncle John.
"But you've money, sir, for I marked you squandering it on the train,"
said Patsy, severely. "So out with it, and we'll count up, and see how
much of an allowance I can make you 'till you get the job."
Uncle John laughed and drew his chair up to the table. Then he emptied
his trousers' pockets upon the cloth, and Patsy gravely separated the
keys and jackknife from the coins and proceeded to count the money.
"Seven dollars and forty-two cents," she announced. "Any more?"
Uncle John hesitated a moment, and then drew from an inner pocket of
his coat a thin wallet. From this, when she had received it from his
hand, the girl abstracted two ten and one five dollar bills, all crisp
and new.
"Good gracious!" she cried, delightedly. "All this wealth, and you
pleading poverty?"
"I never said I was a pauper," returned Uncle John, complacently.
"You couldn't, and be truthful, sir," declared the girl. "Why, this
will last for ages, and I'll put it away safe and be liberal with
your allowance. Let me see," pushing the coins about with her slender
fingers, "you just keep the forty-two cents, Uncle John. It'll do for
car-fare and a bit of lunch now and then, and when you get broke you
can come to me."
"He smokes," observed the Major, significantly.
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There was once an honest journeyman tailor, by name Labakan, who learned his trade with an excellent master in Alexandria. It could not be said that Labakan was unhandy with the needle; on the contrary, he could make excellent work: moreover, one would have done him injustice to have called him lazy. Nevertheless, his companions knew not what to make of him, for he would often sew for hours together so rapidly that the needle would glow in his hand, and the thread smoke, and that none could equal him.
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