“We had over two hundred and fifty,” I replied.
“Yesterday afternoon we had a fair freight down; but we can’t do anything against that new steamer, especially when you have a band of music on board,” added the major. “Will you take some of this cold chicken?”
“Thank you, sir—a little. For your sake I am sorry the steamboat line is doing so well.”
“You can do anything you please with Colonel Wimpleton, just now,” he added.
“I think not, sir.”
“I believe you can. The fact is, you suggested the plan by which the railroad line has been defeated.”
“But the plan is already in working order, and it will go on just as well without me as with me.”
“I am sorry we had any trouble with you, Wolf, for suddenly from a boy you have become a man, and a dangerous man, too, for our side of the lake.”
I was forced to believe that this was mere flattery, intended to help along some object not yet mentioned.
“I have done the best I could for my employers, on whichever side I happened to be engaged.”