Through a combination of events I find myself obliged to temporarily
suspend payment. I ask the depositors to be patient, and their claims
will be met. I think I can pay twenty-five cents on the dollar, if given
a little time. I shall not run away. I shall stay right here till all
matters are honorably settled.
James G. Sanford.
Lincoln hastily pinned this paper to the window-sash so that it could be
seen from without, then pulled down the blinds and locked the door. His
fun-loving nature rose superior to his rage for the moment. "There'll be
the devil to pay in this burg before two hours."
He slipped out the back way, taking the keys with him. "I'll go and tell
uncle, and then we'll see if Jim can't turn in the house on our account,"
he thought, as he harnessed a team to drive out to McPhail's.
The first man to try the door was an old Norwegian in a spotted Mackinac
jacket and a fur cap, with the inevitable little red tippet about his
neck. He turned the knob, knocked, and at last saw the writing, which he
could not read, and went away to tell Johnson that the bank was closed.
Johnson thought nothing special of that; it was early, and they weren't
very particular to open on time, anyway.
Then the barber across the street tried to get in to have a bill changed.
Trying to peer in the window, he saw the notice, which he read with a
grin.
"One o' Link's jobs," he explained to the fellows in the shop. "He's too
darned lazy to open on time, so he puts up notice that the bank is
bu'sted."
"Let's go and see."
"Don't do it! He's watchin' to see us all rush across and look. Just keep
quiet, and see the solid citizens rear around."
Old Orrin McIlvaine came out of the post-office and tried the door next,
then stood for a long time reading the notice, and at last walked
thoughtfully away. Soon he returned, to the merriment of the fellows in
the barber shop, with two or three solid citizens who had been smoking an
after-breakfast cigar and planning a deer-hunt. They stood before the
window in a row and read the notice. McIlvaine gesticulated with his
cigar.
"Gentlemen, there's a pig loose here."
"One o' Link's jokes, I reckon."
"But that's Sanford's writin'. An' here it is nine o'clock, and no one
round. I don't like the looks of it, myself."
The crowd thickened; the fellows came out of the blacksmith shop, while
the jokers in the barber shop smote their knees and yelled with
merriment.
"What's up?" queried Vance, coming up and repeating the universal
question.
McIlvaine pointed at the poster with his cigar.
Vance read the notice, while the crowd waited silently.
"What ye think of it?" asked some one, impatiently.