Well, he laughs an' slaps me on the back an' sez, "I like your style. Want to take a ride?"
"What on?" sez I, for he seemed purty blocky an' fat-legged for a ridin' man.
"On that there sailboat," sez he, pointin' to a thing about the size of a flat-iron with a knittin'-needle stickin' out of it. I give a little think, an' I sez: "To tell you the gospel truth, Bud, I ain't never been on a sailboat in my life; but I'm game to play her one whirl if you'll just wait until I get my breakfast."
"How long will it take?" sez he. "Deuced if I know," sez I. "I've been waitin' hereabout two hours already an' the' ain't none showed up yet."
"Why don't you go to a restaurant?" sez he.
"I thank you kindly for the suggestion," sez I; "but the same brilliant idee occurred to me a little over two hours ago, an' all my finger-nails is wore to the quick tryin' to scratch up enough change."
He studied my face a moment, then he chuckled up a laugh, an' scooted over to an eatin'-house, comin' back with a lot o' stuff an' some coffee. Then we got into the boat an' begun to sail. Oh, it certainly was grand! By the time I had made it up with my stomach we were out on the Pacific Ocean, an' I felt like Christopher Columbus.
Enjoy myself? Well. I guess I did! I felt like a boy with copper-toed boots an' a toy balloon. Then things began to churn up wild an' furious. Fatty said that Pacific meant mild an' peaceful—the darned, sarcastic, little liar! The storm that was presently kazooin' along was fierce an' horrible, an' that dinky little soap-bubble cut up scand'lous.
We went jumpin' an' slidin' ahead, tilted away over on one side, but Fatty never turned a hair; he said it was nothin' but a capful o' wind, an' he sat in the back end o' the boat with a little stick in his hand, hummin' tunes an' havin' the time of his life; but give me a bunch of blizzard-scared long-horns for mine.
I never knowed a boat was so human. This one bucked an' kicked an' reared up an' tried to fall over on its back, the same as a mustang; while I held on with my teeth an' wondered if it was a put-up job. Then I began to feel as though I had partakin' of a balloon. I gritted my teeth an' swallered hot water constant; but it wasn't no use; purty soon that beautiful breakfast began to fight its way to liberty. Layer after layer, up it came; an' all the while mebbe I wasn't feelin' like a tender-foot, with that fat little cuss puffin' his pipe in the back seat, as happy as a toad.