"I want to ride with you as far as Crofton's," he added. "I have been very busy getting ready, and haven't had time to black my boots yet. It's a pretty stylish party I'm going to, and I want to look as scrumptious as any of them. Will you black them for me? I'll be much obliged to you if you will."
"Certainly I will, Ham, when you ask me in that way, and glad to do it for you," I replied, without hesitating an instant.
I took the boots and went to work upon them. There was an unmistakable smile of triumph on his face as I did so; but I was perfectly satisfied that the triumph was mine, not his. Doubtless those civil, polite words were an invention of the enemy, to win my compliance; and Ham, forgetting that I had not rebelled against the work, but only the tyrannical style of his order, was weak enough to believe that he had conquered me. I made up my mind to review the circumstances, and explain my position to him, on the way to Crofton's.
"Hasn't that letter come yet, Captain Fishley?" asked an ancient maiden lady, who entered the store while I was polishing Ham's boots.
"I haven't seen anything of it yet, Miss Larrabee," replied the postmaster.
"Dear me! What shall I do!" exclaimed the venerable spinster. "My brother, down in Ohio, promised to send me forty dollars; and I want the money awfully. I was going down to see Jim's folks, but I can't go, nor nothin', till that money comes. I hain't got nothin' to pay for goin' with, you see."
"I'm very sorry, Miss Larrabee. Perhaps the letter will come in to-night's mail," added the captain.
"But the mail don't git in till nine or ten o'clock, and that's after bedtime. Ethan writ me the money would be here by to-day, at the furthest. You don't suppose it's got lost--do you?"
"I think not. We've never lost anything in our office, leastwise not since I've been postmaster," answered Captain Fishley, who seemed to attribute the fact to his own superior management.
"It may come up to-night, as you say, and I will be down again in the morning to see about it," replied Miss Larrabee, as she left the store, hopeful that the money would arrive in season to enable her to depart the next day on her journey.
I finished blacking Ham's boots, and he put them on. He was going to a party at Crofton's, and had already dressed himself as sprucely as the resources of Torrentville would permit. He was seventeen years old, and somewhat inclined to be "fast." He was rather a good-looking fellow--an exceedingly good-looking fellow in his own estimation. Being an only son, his father and mother were disposed to spoil him, though not even Ham wholly escaped the sharp points and obliquities of his mother's temper. His father gave him what he believed to be a liberal allowance of spending money; but on this subject there was a disagreement between Ham and the "old man."