“Skinner is no fool,” continued the attorney. “As soon as he hears that Miss Briggs has those four things he will probably rush right up to her house and offer to buy them. It would be a great feather in his cap with her, if he could get the credit of having thought of it. I shouldn't wonder if he had heard of what was in that box by this time. It seems a pity, doesn't it, that he should get all the credit after you have done all the work?”
The Colonel looked at the noncommittal face of the attorney, and smiled again. This was a sort of cunning he could appreciate, and he leaned over and gave Toole a sly poke in the ribs, to show him that he understood. Toole looked at him with a blank face, and at this the Colonel slapped his knee, and uttered a mirthful noise that was like the sound of a man choking. He clapped his greasy hat on his mat of hair and went out, pausing at the door to look back and grin at the attorney once more.
Mr. Skinner was trimming a roast. He had just cut off a piece of suet, which he held in his plump red hand as he listened to the Colonel's proposition to sell him four nickel-plated fire-extinguishers at ten dollars each. Perhaps the Colonel spoke too impetuously; too commandingly. Skinner held the lump of suet offensively near the Colonel's nose as he answered.
“Fire-extinguishers!” he laughed. “Me buy fire-extinguishers? I wouldn't give THAT for them.”
He shook the suet before the Colonel's eyes.
“No, sir!” he sneered. “I wouldn't give THAT for them. And I throw that away!”
“Skinner,” said the Colonel, growing dangerously red in the face, “don't you shake no meat in MY face like that! Don't you dare do it! I won't have no butcher shake meat in MY face. You low-down beef-killer. That's all you are, a beef-killer.”
“Mebby,” admitted the butcher indifferently. “Mebby I am, but I don't buy no fire-extinguishers. And I don't take much stock in agents for them, neither. No. Nor in gold bricks. Nor green good. No.”
The Colonel raised his fist and brought it down on the butcher's counter so hard that the meat scales danced, and the indicator jerked nervously across the face of the dial, weighing a half pound of anger. The butcher leaned back against the shopping block, and gently caressed the handle of his cleaver. He pointed to the door with his other hand.
“Git out!” he said, and the Colonel scowled but went.