Off he rowed, and pulling up my line I left the Greyhound to the Kanaka watchman and took the ferry over to ’Frisco.
The laundry was banging away, the Chinks all hard at work, Mrs. Slade wasn’t home, over at St. Jo for the day, so the forewoman said, but Buck was in and upstairs, and up I went.
They’d got a fine sitting-room on the first floor with plush-covered chairs and brand new old-fashioned looking furniture and a bowl of goldfish in the window and pictures in big gold frames on the walls.
Buck was sitting in an easy chair reading a paper and smoking a cigar.
“Hullo,” he says, “here’s a coincidence, for I was just coming over to Tiburon to see you.”
“Oh, were you?” says I. “Wits jump sometimes and here I am on the same job. How’s the world using you, Buck?”
I tried to be as light-hearted as I could, but it was hard work. Buck had gone off in looks, and it was plain to see things weren’t going easy with him, you can always tell when a chap has something on his mind, and whilst he was getting out drinks I sat putting my thoughts together and only waiting to begin. I’d fixed to do a big grab, and get ten thousand dollars out of him as a loan to hide away for him against the time he got the kick out, plucked naked, as Newall had said.
He pours the whisky.
“Buck,” I says, taking the glass. “I’ve come to ask a favour of you. I want a loan.”
“How much?” asks Buck.