“Christmas gift, Mr. Miller!” cried Pole. “I ketched you that time.”
“And if I paid up, you'd cuss me out,” retorted the lawyer, with a laugh. “I haven't forgotten the row you raised about that suit of clothes. Well, what's the news? How's your family?”
“About as common, Mr. Miller,” said Pole. “My wife's gittin' younger an' younger ever'day. Sence she moved in 'er new house, an' got to whitewashin' fences an' makin' flower-beds, an' one thing another, she looks like a new person. I'd 'a' bought 'er a house long ago ef I'd 'a' knowed she wanted it that bad. Oh, we put on the lugs now! We wipe with napkins after eatin', an' my littlest un sets in a high-chair an' says 'Please pass the gravy,' like he'd been off to school. Sally says she's a-goin' to send 'em, an' I don't keer ef she does; they 'll stand head, ef they go; the'r noggin' s look like squashes, but they're full o' seeds, an' don't you ferget it.”
“That they are!” intoned Abner Daniel.
“I've drapped onto a little news,” said Pole. “You know what a old moonshiner cayn't pick up in these mountains from old pards ain't wuth lookin' fer.”
“Railroad?” asked Miller, interestedly.
“That's fer you-uns to make out,” said Baker. “Now, I ain't a-goin' to give away my authority, but I rid twenty miles yesterday to substantiate what I heerd, an' know it's nothin' but the truth. You all know old Bobby Milburn's been buyin' timber-land up about yore property, don't you?”
“I didn't know how much,” answered Miller, “but I knew he had secured some.”
“Fust and last in the neighborhood o' six thousand acres,” affirmed Pole, “an' he's still on the war-path. What fust attracted my notice was findin' out that old Bobby hain't a dollar to his name. That made me suspicious, an' I went to work to investigate.”
“Good boy!” said Uncle Abner, in an admiring undertone.