Reddekop knew I was a stranger in town, and maybe he was counting on my not being able to find anyone qualified to audit the trust, but I had an ace up my sleeve. I wasn't anybody's fool.
"That sounds fair," I said.
#
Back at my Mama's I'd had long hard days, doing chores: chopping wood, stacking hay, weeding the garden, carrying water. I'd go to bed bone-tired, limp as a rag and as exhausted as I thought I could be.
Boy, was I wrong! By the time I found Mr Adelson's rooming house, I could barely stand, my mouth was dry as a salt-flat, and it was hard to keep my eyes open. They've got hills in San Francisco that must've been some kind of joke God played. His landlady, a worn-out grey woman whose sour expression seemed directed at everything and anything, let me in and pointed me up three rickety flights of stairs to Mr Adelson's room.
I dragged my luggage up with me, bumping it on the stairs, and rapped on the door. Mr Adelson answered in the same shirtsleeves and suspenders I'd seen him in that Christmas, an age ago, when my Mama dragged me to his cottage. "James!" he said.
"Mr Adelson," I said. "Sorry to drop in like this."
He took my bag from me and ushered me into his room, pulling up a chair. "What on earth are you doing here?" he said. "Do your parents know where you are? Are you all right? Have you eaten? Are you hungry?"
"I'm pretty hungry — I haven't eaten since supper last night on the train," I tried to make it sound jaunty, but I'm afraid it came out pretty tired-sounding."
"I'll fix us sandwiches," he said, and started fishing around his sea-chest. I watched his shoulders move for a moment, and then my eyes closed.