"You are sure your old gentleman won't mind my coming with you?" murmured Christopher, as they neared the house.
"Oh, Mr. Hawley won't mind. I have been coming here for years. He never lets anybody else touch his clocks. If he is at home, he will probably be proud as a peacock to show you his treasures; and if he isn't you can look about by yourself. He never minds what I do."
On investigation, however, it proved that Mr. Hawley was not at home.
"He done gone to some board meeting this morning," explained the colored butler. "And sorry enough he'll be to miss you too, Mr. McPhearson, for he always likes havin' a talk with you."
"Which clock is it this time, Ebenezer?"
"Number Seventeen, sir," answered the darky gravely. "She done been kickin' up something vexatious. She absumlutely won't strike with the others—absumlutely won't! After the rest of 'em are through, in she comes a minute late, chiming away on her own hook, all independent like, as if she was runnin' the world. You know what that means. Mr. Hawley, sir, he won't stand for no nonsense like that—not for a second. If there's any strikin' to be done round here, or chimin' either, it's got to be done in chorus or not at all. Ain't he been well-nigh a year trainin' those clocks? We've got 'em down now almighty fine too—'cept for Number Seventeen."
"I'll have a look at her."
"Do, sir! She's on the stairway, you know, halfway up."
"Oh, I remember her, although I don't believe I could give her number offhand."
"I could. I could recite the numbers of them clocks frontways an' backways," answered Ebenezer. "You could, too, if you had 'em to wind."