“Why shouldn’t he be proud of him?” he demanded, his thumb on an item, his glasses on the end of his nose. “You listen here a minute.”
He began to read in a sing-song manner:
“A well-founded rumour from the State House is to the effect that the Governor has tendered the vacant Supreme Court judgeship to the Hon. Phineas Look, of Palermo. Mr. Look’s legal qualifications are too well known in this State to need comment. It is understood that he is in no sense an active candidate, and the honour has been tendered by the Governor to the Palermo man by the Executive’s initiative, the Governor following his frequently expressed intention of letting certain appointments within his gift seek the man. A Supreme Court judgeship is certainly not an office to be hawked among politicians, and such an appointment will be a credit to the State and the Bar. Mr. Look is——”
Brickett ran his eye down the column.
“There’s pretty nigh a whole colume here about him,” he said. “But there ain’t any need of readin’ it. It’s matters we’re all knowin’ to about him. Papers was lookin’ for somethin’ to fill up with, I persume.”
He flopped the sheet.
“What I wanted in pertickler to call your attention to,” he went on, “was something reel interestin’. It says here that a man has shot himself in a New York lodging-house, and from marks on his clothes and his papers it is supposed that he is King Bradish, who was at one time well known in certain sportin’ quarters. That must be our King Bradish, don’t you s’pose so?”
“Prob’ly,” said Uncle Buck without great interest. “And I’m glad he done it before he’d skun the last cent out of his poor old mother. I guess she ain’t got much left, as it is.”
“Well, signs and wonders never cease,” sighed Marriner Amazeen, relighting his pipe; “as I said when I witnessed Sum Badger’s new will t’other day,” he continued between puffs.
“Haskell’s girl gits it, does she?” asked Babb.