“What about?”
“New patent steel traps and spring-guns are set in these grounds,” said Stan, laughing.
“All right, my lad. Joke away; but I’m on my mettle, and if we can’t contrive something better than walls and barricades of tea-chests and silk it’s very strange.”
“Well, we ought to, certainly.”
“And we will. Just think of what a lot of good stuff has been made absolutely worthless. There is, I should say, a couple or three hundred pounds’ worth of tea and silk—more perhaps—perfectly unsaleable.”
“Couldn’t you send it to market under another name?” said Stan, laughing.
“Name? What name?” growled Blunt contemptuously. “You can’t sell tea that has been exposed to fire. What would you call it—coffee?”
“No; gunpowder tea,” cried Stan merrily.
“One to you,” said Blunt, with a grim laugh. “But what about your silk?”
“Oh, that’s easy!” said Stan. “Call that shot silk.”