It is impossible to say what good Master Spry thought he could effect by having this notice put up in his own home, where no one would see it but his friends, who knew all the particulars; but it seemed to afford him a great deal of satisfaction to look at it, which Ben concluded was the reason why he had done it.
“Hain’t heard nothin’ ’bout Tim?” asked Ben, after he and Mopsey had spelled the notice out with considerable difficulty, and many misgivings as to whether Jersey should be spelled with a G or a J.
Dickey shook his head and tried to sigh; but he had such a large piece of herring in his month that he did not dare to attempt it.
“I don’t ’xpect I ever shall,” he said, sadly, as soon as he had swallowed enough of the fish to admit of his speaking plainly. “I’ve offered to give ten cents, jest as I’ve got it there, if anybody will tell me where he is; but I don’t hear nothin’ of him.”
Ben and Mopsey sat for a few moments in silence, as if to better express their sympathy, and then the latter asked,
“How’s biz, Dick?”
“Well, it ain’t so awful good, nor it ain’t so dreadful bad,” was the non-committal reply. “I s’pose I shall get along; but I wish I could git a holt of Tim Dooley; then I’d be pretty well fixed.”
The visitors looked as if they thought it would be of very little advantage to Dickey if he should succeed in finding the defaulter, and Dickey said, quickly, as if they had spoken their doubts,
“If I can catch him, I’ll make him pay me back somehow, whether he’s got it or not.”
It was rather a rash assertion; but Dickey spoke so confidently that his visitors thought it best not to argue the question, and Ben concluded that it was about time to proceed with the business for which they had come. After he had explained just what it was they needed for the completion of their theatre, during which time Dickey sat rubbing his chin, the personification of wisdom, the two waited for Master Spry to give them the benefit of his knowledge.