David Harum, Act II
"'Look a-here, 'Zeke Swinney,' I says, 'I've got an int'rist in that prop'ty, an' I propose to p'tect it. You're goin' to sign that morgige over to me, or I'll foreclose an' surrygate ye,' I says, 'unless you allow to bid in the prop'ty, in which case we'll see whose weasel-skin's the longest. But I guess it won't come to that,' I says. 'You kin take your choice,' I says. 'Whether I want to git holt o' that prop'ty myself ain't neither here nor there. Mebbe I do, an' mebbe I don't, but anyways,' I says, 'you don't git it, nor wouldn't ever, for if I can't make you sign over, I'll either do what I said or I'll back the widder in a defence fer usury. Put that in your pipe an' smoke it,' I says.
"'What do you mean?' he says, gittin' half out his chair.
"'I mean this,' I says, 'that the fust six months the widder couldn't pay she gin you ten dollars to hold off, an' the next time she gin you fifteen, an' that you've bled her fer shaves to the tune of sixty odd dollars in three years, an' then got your int'rist in full.'
"That riz him clean out of his chair," said David. "'She can't prove it,' he says, shakin' his fist in the air.
"'Oh, ho! ho!' I says, tippin' my chair back agin the wall. 'If Mis' Cullom was to swear how an' where she paid you the money, givin' chapter an' verse, and showin' her own mem'randums even, an' I was to swear that when I twitted you with gittin' it you didn't deny it, but only said that she couldn't prove it, how long do you think it 'ould take a Freeland County jury to find agin ye? I allow, 'Zeke Swinney,' I says, 'that you wa'n't born yestid'y, but you ain't so old as you look, not by a dum sight!' an' then how I did laugh!
"Wa'al," said David, as he got down off the stool and stretched himself, yawning, "I guess I've yarned it enough fer one day. Don't fergit to send Mis' Cullom that notice, an' make it up an' up. I'm goin' to git the thing off my mind this trip."
"Very well, sir," said John, "but let me ask, did Swinney assign the mortgage without any trouble?"
"O Lord! yes," was the reply. "The' wa'n't nothin' else fer him to do. I had another twist on him that I hain't mentioned. But he put up a great show of doin' it to obleege me. Wa'al, I thanked him an' so on, an' when we'd got through I ast him if he wouldn't step over to the 'Eagil' an' take somethin', an' he looked kind o' shocked an' said he never drinked nothin'. It was 'gin his princ'ples, he said. Ho, ho, ho, ho! Scat my——! Princ'ples!" and John heard him chuckling to himself all the way out of the office.