第21章

"Why, nothin', I guess," he faltered."Only--only--well, I tell you, Mrs.Barnes, if--if you was figgerin' on doin' any business with Mr.Cobb, any money business, I mean, and--and you'd rather go anywheres else I--I--well, I'm pretty well acquainted round here on the Cape amongst the bank folks and such and I'd be real glad to--"Thankful interrupted.She had, after much misgiving and reluctance, made up her mind to approach her distant relative with the mortgage proposition, but to discuss that proposition with strangers was, to her mind, very different.She had mentioned the proposed mortgage to Emily, but she had told no one else, not even the captain himself.And she did not mean to tell.The boarding house plan must stand or fall according to Mr.Cobb's reception of it.

"No, no," she said, hastily."It ain't anything important--that is, very important.""Well, all right.You see--I only meant--excuse me, Mrs.Barnes.

I hope you don't think I meant to be nosey or interferin' in your affairs.""Of course I don't.You've gone to a lot of trouble on my account as 'tis, and you've been real kind."The captain hurriedly muttered that he hadn't been kind at all and watched her as she walked up the short path to Mr.Cobb's front door.Then, with a solemn shake of the head, he clinched again at the wagon seat and drove across the road to the hitching-posts before the store.Thankful opened the door of the "henhouse" and entered.

The interior of the little building was no mare inviting than its outside.One room, dark, with a bare floor, and with cracked plastered walls upon which a few calendars and an ancient map were hanging.There was a worn wooden settee and two wooden armchairs at the front, near the stove, and at the rear an old-fashioned walnut desk.

At this desk in a shabby, leather-cushioned armchair, sat a little old man with scant gray hair and a fringe of gray throat whiskers.

He wore steel-rimmed spectacles and over these he peered at his visitor.

"Good mornin'," said Thankful.It seemed to her high time that someone said something, and the little man had not opened his lips.

He did not open them even now.

"Um," he grunted, and that was all.

"Are you Mr.Solomon Cobb?" she asked.She knew now that he was;he had changed a great deal since she had last seen him, but his eyes had not changed, and he still had the habit she remembered, that of pulling at his whiskers in little, short tugs as if trying to pull them out."Like a man hauling wild carrots out of a turnip patch," she wrote Emily when describing the interview.

He did not answer the question.Instead, after another long look, he said:

"If you're sellin' books, I don't want none.Don't use 'em."This was so entirely unexpected that Mrs.Barnes was, for the moment, confused and taken aback.

"Books!" she repeated, wonderingly."I didn't say anything about books.I asked you if you was Mr.Cobb."Another look."If you're sellin' or peddlin' or agentin' or anything I don't want none," said the little man."I'm tellin' you now so's you can save your breath and mine.I've got all I want."Thankful looked at him and his surroundings.This ungracious and unlooked for reception began to have its effect upon her temper; as she wrote Emily in the letter, her "back fin began to rise." It was on the tip of her tongue to say that, judging by appearances, he should want a good many things, politeness among others.But she did not say it.

"I ain't a peddler or a book agent," she declared, crisply."When I ask you to buy, seems to me 'twould be time enough to say no.If you're Solomon Cobb, and I know you are, I've come to see you on business."The word "business" had an effect.Mr.Cobb swung about in his chair and regarded her fixedly.There was a slight change in his tone.

"Business, hey?" he repeated."Well, I'm a business man, ma'am.

What sort of business is it you've got?"

Thankful did not answer the question immediately.Instead she walked nearer to the desk.

"Yes," she said, slowly, "you're Solomon Cobb.I should know you anywhere now.And I ain't seen you for twenty year.I presume likely you don't know me."The man of business stared harder than ever.He took off his spectacles, rubbed them with his handkerchief, put them on and stared again.

"No, ma'am, I don't," he said."You don't live in Trumet, I know that.You ain't seen me for twenty year, eh? Twenty year is quite a spell.And yet there's somethin' sort of--sort of familiar about you, now that I look closer.Who be you?""My name is Thankful Barnes--now.It didn't used to be.When you knew me 'twas Thankful Cahoon.My grandmother, on my father's side, was your mother's own cousin.Her name was Matilda Myrick.

That makes you and me sort of distant relations, Mr.Cobb."If she expected this statement to have the effect of making the little man more cordial she was disappointed.In fact, if it had any effect at all, it was the opposite, judging by his manner and expression.His only comments on the disclosure of kinship were a "Humph!" and a brief "Want to know!" He stared at Thankful and she at him.Then he said:

"Well?"

Mrs.Barnes was astonished.

"Well?" she repeated."What's well? What do you mean by that?""Nothin's I know of.You said you came to see me about some business or other.What sort of business?""I came to see you about gettin' some money.I need some money just now and--"Solomon interrupted her.

"Humph!" he grunted."I cal'lated as much.""You cal'lated it! For the land sakes--why?""Because you begun by sayin' you was a relation of mine.I've got a good many relations floatin' around loose and there ain't nary one of 'em ever come to see me unless 'twas to get money.If Igive money to all my relations that asked for it I'd be a dum sight poorer'n I be now."Thankful was by this time thoroughly angry.