“Um.... Hopple is my name—Samuel Cassibaum Hopple.”
“Well, Mr. Hopple,” came the foxy plan, “knowing the layout as you do, suppose you go back and ask Noah if we can’t have a special evening rate—a dollar and ninety-eight cents, or something like that. As you’re leaving with us, I think the gang in the ark ought to sort of set up the treats. Don’t you?”
But old Samuel Cassibaum Goliath Hopple was no dumb-bell. Not on Tuesday evening, anyway.
“Um ...” came sharply, to let us know that he was setting his big foot down and wanted no further nonsense from us. “You jest come across with that two dollars an’ quit tryin’ to work me.”
“But, listen—” Poppy hung on.
“They hain’t nothin’ to ‘listen’ to. We owe the money. An’ bein’ an honest an’ upright man, I hain’t a-goin’ to have it on my conscience that I skipped out an’ never collected it. It’s my last duty.”
But Poppy was as hard to corner as a lost collar button.
“You say we owe the town two dollars. All right. How much do you weigh?”
“Me?” came in surprise. “About three hundred pounds.”
“Jerry and I together don’t weigh that much,” says Poppy. “So, according to weight, you pay a dollar and we pay fifty cents apiece.”