“The cashier will attend strictly and exclusively to his bank duties, and to nothing else,” declared Vaniman, with heat.
“Hope you're enjoying 'em, such as they are of late,” Jones retorted. “But once again, what say, Squire Hexter?”
“Boys, you'd better get somebody else to sandpaper Tasper Britt with. I'm not gritty enough.”
“I'll come across with our full idea, Squire. It ain't simply to sandpaper Britt with that we want you to go. But we need some kind of legislation to help this town out of the hole. We don't know where we are. We can't raise money to pay state taxes, and we ain't getting our school money from the state, nor any share of the roads appropriation, nor—”
“I know, Ike,” broke in the Squire, not requiring any legal posting from a layman. “But it's the lobbyist, instead of the legislator, who really counts at the state capital. I've been planning to do a little lobbying at the next session. I'll tell you now that I'll go, and, by hooking a clean collar around each ankle under my socks, I'll be prepared for a two weeks' stay. Send somebody else to work for the state and I'll go and work for Egypt.”
“The voters want you,” Jones insisted.
The Squire rapped his toe against the old dog at his feet. “What say, Eli?”
“Wuff!” the dog replied, emphatically.
“Can't go as a legislator, boys! Eli says 'No.'”
“This ain't no time for joking,” growled the spokesman.