DEAR SIR: This is to notify you that I have rented the entire
Tutt House for the ensuing week, and am compelled to assume
possession of the three second-floor front rooms. Herewith I am
enclosing the fifteen dollars you paid to secure the suite. You
are quite welcome to make use, as my guest, of the small room
over the kitchen. You will find your luggage in that room.
Regretting any inconvenience that this transaction may cause
you, I am,
Yours respectfully,
EDWARD EASTMAN ELLSWORTH.
Mr. Van Kamp passed the note to his wife and sat down on a large
chair. He was glad that the chair was comfortable and roomy. Evelyn
picked up the bills and tucked them into her waist. She never
overlooked any of her perquisites. Mrs. Van Kamp read the note, and
the tip of her nose became white. She also sat down, but she was
the first to find her voice.
“Atrocious!” she exclaimed. “Atrocious! Simply atrocious, Belmont.
This is a house of public entertainment. They _can’t_ turn us out
in this high-minded manner! Isn’t there a law or something to that
effect?”
“It wouldn’t matter if there was,” he thoughtfully replied. “This
fellow Ellsworth would be too clever to be caught by it. He would
say that the house was not a hotel but a private residence during
the period for which he has rented it.”
Personally, he rather admired Ellsworth. Seemed to be a resourceful
sort of chap who knew how to make money behave itself, and do its
little tricks without balking in the harness.
“Then you can make him take down the sign!” his wife declared.
He shook his head decidedly.
“It wouldn’t do, Belle,” he replied. “It would be spite, not
retaliation, and not at all sportsmanlike. The course you suggest
would belittle us more than it would annoy them. There must be some
other way.”
He went in to talk with Uncle Billy.
“I want to buy this place,” he stated. “Is it for sale?”
“It sartin is!” replied Uncle Billy. He did not merely twinkle this
time. He grinned.
“How much?”
“Three thousand dollars.” Mr. Tutt was used to charging by this
time, and he betrayed no hesitation.
“I’ll write you out a check at once,” and Mr. Van Kamp reached in
his pocket with the reflection that the spot, after all, was an
ideal one for a quiet summer retreat.
“Air you a-goin’ t’ scribble that there three thou-san’ on a piece
o’ paper?” inquired Uncle Billy, sitting bolt upright. “Ef you air
a-figgerin’ on that, Mr. Kamp, jis’ you save yore time. I give a
man four dollars fer one o’ them check things oncet, an’ I owe
myself them four dollars yit.”
Mr. Van Kamp retired in disorder, but the thought of his wife and
daughter waiting confidently on the porch stopped him. Moreover,
the thing had resolved itself rather into a contest between
Ellsworth and himself, and he had done a little making and breaking
of men and things in his own time. He did some gatling-gun thinking
out by the newel-post, and presently rejoined Uncle Billy.
“Mr. Tutt, tell me just exactly what Mr. Ellsworth rented, please,”
he requested.
“Th’ hull house,” replied Billy, and then he somewhat sternly
added: “Paid me spot cash fer it, too.”
Mr. Van Kamp took a wad of loose bills from his trousers pocket,
straightened them out leisurely, and placed them in his bill book,
along with some smooth yellowbacks of eye-bulging denominations.
Uncle Billy sat up and stopped twiddling his thumbs.
“Nothing was said about the furniture, was there?” suavely inquired
Van Kamp.
Uncle Billy leaned blankly back in his chair. Little by little the
light dawned on the ex-horse-trader. The crow’s feet reappeared
about his eyes, his mouth twitched, he smiled, he grinned, then he
slapped his thigh and haw-hawed.
“No!” roared Uncle Billy. “No, there wasn’t, by gum!”
“Nothing but the house?”
“His very own words!” chuckled Uncle Billy. “‘‘Jis’ th’ mere
house,’ says he, an’ he gits it. A bargain’s a bargain, an’ I allus
stick to one I make.”
“How much for the furniture for the week?”
“Fifty dollars!” Mr. Tutt knew how to do business with this kind of
people now, you bet.
Mr. Van Kamp promptly counted out the money.
“Drat it!” commented Uncle Billy to himself. “I could ’a’ got more!”
“Now where can we make ourselves comfortable with this furniture?”
Uncle Billy chirked up. All was not yet lost.
“Waal,” he reflectively drawled, “there’s th’ new barn. It hain’t
been used for nothin’ yit, senct I built it two years ago. I jis’
hadn’t th’ heart t’ put th’ critters in it as long as th’ ole one
stood up.”
The other smiled at this flashlight on Uncle Billy’s character, and
they went out to look at the barn.