"If we don't get bad weather."
"Say, do you think I am awake—pinch me—take something and hit me on the head to be sure I am not astraddle a 'Night-Hoss,'" he suggested, pulling himself up on the head of one of the galvanized barrels of emergency gasoline near me, holding his head between his hands to keep his nerves from running away with him.
I looked at him and smiled but did not reply.
"Do you know we have two thousand dollars' worth of freight here, and you say we can get into New Orleans in two days? I must be dreaming."
"But have you figured all the expenses—bar pilotage—river pilotage, dockage and everything?"
"No—not all—but it can't possibly be five hundred dollars; and we can make the round trip in a week. Fifteen hundred dollars a week, Ben; and they say they have enough timber to be moved to keep us going for a year! Ben, I'm dreaming—a coke-eater's dream—and if it wasn't for that infernal Becker matter, how we could clean up!" He charged about savagely as though he had drunk mixed liquor and cocaine.
"You were up all last night; better get some sleep," I suggested.
"Yes, I haven't had a real night's sleep for a long time," he added, with a note of sadness, "and I don't want any yet."
Elated with success, the Becker matter was emphasized as a knife in his heart, and it was keeping him away from Anna Bell Morgan. Success has a way of trying men's hearts in the most unexpected manner.