An Amateur Fireman

"Dan was tellin' me you'd lost your money. Didn't come up here reckonin' he or I'd got it, did you?"

"I ain't any sich fool as that; but Jip Collins has been makin' a good deal of cheap talk this afternoon, an' I thought perhaps you'd like to know 'bout it."

"He's allers doin' that, an' I reckon it's more wind than anythin' else."

"I wouldn't wonder if this time he got right down to business, an' you ought'er keep a pretty sharp lookout, Seth. These are too snug quarters for you to lose through a feller like Jip."

"Come inside and set down," Master Bartlett said as his lodger joined him at the door of the shed. "Dan an' me is here alone, an' you won't mind if it's dark, 'cause you see I promised Mr. Baxter straight out an' out that there shouldn't ever be any kind of a light inside. That's one of the things Jip kicked about, you know."

Sam B