It worried Peter--you could see that. He'd set in
the barn with Jonadab and me, thinking, thinking, and all at once he'd
bust out:
"Bless that Dago's heart! I haven't chummed in with the degenerate
aristocracy much in my time, but somewhere or other I've seen that chap
before. Now where--where--where?"
For the first two weeks the count paid his board like a major; then
he let it slide. Jonadab and me was a little worried, but he was
advertising us like fun, his photographs--snap shots by Peter--was
getting into the papers, so we judged he was a good investment. But
Peter got bluer and bluer.
One night we was in the setting room--me and Jonadab and the count and
Ebenezer. The "queen" and the rest of the boarders was abed.
The count was spinning a pigeon English yarn of how he'd fought a duel
with rapiers. When he'd finished, old Dillaway pounded his knee and sung
out:
"That's bus'ness! That's the way to fix 'em! No lawsuits, no argument,
no delays. Just take 'em out and punch holes in 'em. Did you hear that,
Brown?"
"Yes, I heard it," says Peter, kind of absent-minded like. "Fighting
with razors, wan't it?"
Now there wan't nothing to that--'twas just some of Brown's sarcastic
spite getting the best of him--but I give you my word that the count
turned yellow under his brown skin, kind of like mud rising from the
bottom of a pond.
"What-a you say?" he says, bending for'ards.
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