“You’re an odd devil, Briggs,” said Radnor. He was a small dark man with great mournful eyes and a little clipped moustache over a timorous mouth, and his lips were always twitching. “A queer devil. What I should have done without you, I don’t know. If I could do what I want, I should offer you a partnership.”
“Don’t be a damned fool,” said Triona. “A partner puts in money and I haven’t a bean. Besides if I were a partner, the whole show would go to hell.”
“Why?”
“I should immediately want to go and do something else,” replied Triona.
“I give it up,” said Radnor.
“Best thing you can do,” said Triona.
How could the very grateful young proprietor divine the spiritual crankiness of his foreman? He went through the English equivalent of shoulder shrugging.
Briggs, from the business point of view, was a treasure fallen from Heaven. And Briggs was a mystery. He didn’t begin to pretend to understand Briggs. Briggs obviously didn’t want to be understood. Radnor was a gentleman. He could press the matter no further.
“Let us get this business up to a net profit of three thousand a year and then we may talk,” said Triona.
“Three thou—! Good God, man, I couldn’t talk. I’d slobber and gibber!”