“For good?”
“So’m I!” Buck continued, breathlessly; “I’m quitting the riveh, too! I’ve been down here a good many years. I’ve been thinking. I’m going back. I’m going up the bank again.”
“What’ll you do with the boat?” Grell continued.
“Slip and I’ve been talking it all over. We’re through with it. We guessed the Prophet, here, could use it. We’re going to give it to him.”
“Going to give hit to me!” Rasba started up and stared at the man.
“Yes, Parson; that poplar boat of yours isn’t what you need down here.” Buck smiled. “This big pine boat’s better; you could preach in this boat.”
Tears started in Rasba’s eyes and dripped through his dark whiskers. Buck and Jock had acted with the impulsiveness of gambling men. Something in the fact that Rasba had come down those strange miles had touched them, had given Drones courage to go back and face the music, and to Buck the desire to return into his old life.
“We’re going up on the Kate to-morrow morning,” Buck explained. “Slip’d better show you how to run the gasolene boat if you don’t know how, Parson!”
Dazed by the access of fortune, Rasba spent the mid-afternoon learning to run the 28-foot gasolene launch which was used to tow the big houseboat which would make such a wonderful floating church. It was a big boat only a little more than two years old. Buck had 148 made it himself, on the Upper Mississippi, for a gambling boat. The frame was light, and the cabin was built with double boards, with building paper between, to keep out the cold wintry winds.
“Gentlemen,” Rasba choked, looking at the two donors of the gift, “I’m going to be the best kind of a man I know how––”