“I don’t want to borry no money,” began Mr. Camp when President Elder greeted him with the usual banker’s coolness. “Nor I ain’t come to pay none.”
The banker made courteous offers of chairs to all.
“These air some ole friends o’ mine,” went on the mill owner, selecting a chair near a cuspidor, “an’ they’re a goin’ to help me help some one else.”
“Well, Camp, what can I do for you? Tradin’ horses again?”
The farmer-miller shook his head.
“Me an’ you knowed Bud Wilson’s father, Josiah.”
“Very well,” responded the banker. “And I’ve just come to know the boy.”
“So’ve I,” exclaimed Mr. Camp, drawing over and using the cuspidor. “That’s the pint. An’ to keep to the pint, I got to tell you somepin’ mebbe ye don’t know. Bud’s father was a neighbor o’ mine, as ye might say. An’ we farmers sort o’ keep clost watch o’ each other. When ye knowed Mr. Wilson, he lived in town.”
“Then he bought a farm out your way—out about Little Town.”
“He did. An’ what’s curious, he paid for it—cash—four thousand eight hundred dollars for eighty acres.”