"Getz and Absalom left me with the assurance that at the Saturday-night meeting of the Board I'd be voted out. If it depends on them—and I suppose it does—I'm done for. They'd like to roast me over a slow fire!"
"You bet they would!"
"I suppose I haven't the least chance?"
"Well, I don' know—I don' know. It would suit me wonderful to get ahead of Jake Getz and them Puntzes in this here thing—if I anyways could! Le' me see." He thoughtfully considered the situation. "The Board meets day after to-morrow. There's six directors. Nathaniel Puntz and Jake can easy get 'em all to wote to put you out, fur they ain't anyways stuck on you—you bein' so tony that way. Now me, I don't mind it—them things don't never bother me any—manners and cleanness and them."
"Cleanness?"
"Och, yes; us we never seen any person where wasted so much time washin' theirself—except Miss Margaret. I mind missus used to say a clean towel didn't last Miss Margaret a week, and no one else usin' it! You see, what the directors don't like is your ALWAYS havin' your hands so clean. Now they reason this here way—a person that never has dirty hands is lazy and too tony."
"Yes?"
"But me, I don't mind. And I'm swanged if I wouldn't like to beat out Jake and Nathaniel on this here deal! Say! I'll tell you what. This here game's got fun in it fur me! I believe I got a way of DOIN' them fellers. I ain't tellin' you what it is!" he said, with a chuckle. "But it's a way that's goin' to WORK! I'm swanged if it ain't! You'll see oncet! You just let this here thing to me and you won't be chased off your job! I'm doin' it fur the sake of the fun I'll get out of seein' Jake Getz surprised! Mebbe that old Dutchman won't be wonderful spited!"
"I shall be very much indebted to you, doctor, if you can help me, as it suits me to stay here for the present."
"That's all right. Fur one, there's Adam Oberholzer; he 'll be an easy guy when it comes to his wote. Fur if I want, I can bring a bill ag'in' the estate of his pop, disceased, and make it 'most anything. His pop he died last month. Now that there was a man"—the doctor settled himself comfortably, preparatory to the relation of a tale—"that there was a man that was so wonderful set on speculatin' and savin' and layin' by, that when he come to die a pecooliar thing happened. You might call that there thing phe-non-e-ma. It was this here way. When ole Adam Oberholzer (he was named after his son, Adam Oberholzer, the school director) come to die, his wife she thought she'd better send fur the Evangelical preacher over, seein' as Adam he hadn't been inside a church fur twenty years back, and, to be sure, he wasn't just so well prepared. Oh, well, he was deef fur three years back, and churches don't do much good to deef people. But then he never did go when he did have his sound hearin'. Many's the time he sayed to me, he sayed, 'I don't believe in the churches,' he sayed, 'and blamed if it don't keep me busy believin' in a Gawd!' he sayed. So you see, he wasn't just what you might call a pillar of the church. One time he had such a cough and he come to me and sayed whether I could do somepin. 'You're to leave tobacco be,' I sayed. Ole Adam he looked serious. 'If you sayed it was caused by goin' to church,' he answered to me, 'I might mebbe break off. But tobacco—that's some serious,' he says. Adam he used to have some notions about the Bible and religion that I did think, now, was damned unushal. Here one day when he was first took sick, before he got so deef yet, I went to see him, and the Evangelical preacher was there, readin' to him that there piece of Scripture where, you know, them that worked a short time was paid the same as them that worked all day. The preacher he sayed he thought that par'ble might fetch him 'round oncet to a death-bed conwersion. But I'm swanged if Adam didn't just up and say, when the preacher got through, he says, 'That wasn't a square deal accordin' to MY way of lookin' at things.' Yes, that's the way that there feller talked. Why, here oncet—" the doctor paused to chuckle at the recollection—"when I got there, Reverend was wrestlin' with Adam to get hisself conwerted, and it was one of Adam's days when he was at his deefest. Reverend he shouted in his ear, 'You must experience religion—and get a change of heart—and be conwerted before you die!' 'What d' you say?' Adam he ast. Then Reverend, he seen that wouldn't work, so he cut it short, and he says wery loud, 'Trust the Lord!' Now, ole Adam Oberholzer in his business dealin's and speculatin' was always darned particular who he trusted, still, so he looked up at Reverend, and he says, 'Is he a reliable party?' Well, by gum, I bu'st right out laughin'! I hadn't ought to—seein' it was Adam's death-bed—and Reverend him just sweatin' with tryin' to work in his job to get him conwerted till he passed away a'ready. But I'm swanged if I could keep in! I just HOLLERED!"