And how much do you guess? A pair of double X's! He'd worried himself near sick, worked himself up desp'rate, and had finished by doin' something that stood to get him put away for ten or fifteen years—all for forty bucks!
"Piddie," says I, "for a tinhorn, you're a wonder! But, say, when you get home to-night tell that kid of yours I want to see them new shoes of his before he gets the toes all stubbed out."
CHAPTER VIII
A WHIRL WITH KAZEDKY
Chee! W'atcher think? I ain't read an "Old Sleut'" for more'n a week, and there's two murder myst'ries runnin' in the sportin' extras that I'm way behind on. You wouldn't guess it in a month, but I'm takin' a fall out of the knowledge game. Mr. Mallory says I'm part in the sixt' grade and part in the eight'.
"I believe it," says I; "my nut feels that way."
Honest, I'm stowin' away so much that I never knew before that I'm thinkin' of wearin' a leather strap around my head, same's these strong boys wears 'em on their wrists.
"Ah! w'at's the use?" says I. "Nobody's ever goin' to ask me what's four per cent of thoity thousand plunks, an' if I had that much I wouldn't farm it out for less'n six, anyway. And I don't see where this De Soto comes in. Sounds like he might have played first base for the Beanies; but he's been dead too long for that. What odds does it make if I don't know the capital of Nevada? I ain't lookin' for no divorce, am I?"