Then he'll whale me with his whip, and shout, 'You know where it is.
Tell me, tell me, you swine, or I'll do for you.' An' then he'll get
down on his knees and whimper, and beg me to tell um where I've hid it.
He's just gone plum crazy. Sometimes he has regular fits, he gets so
mad, and rolls on the floor and scratches himself."

One morning in November, about ten o'clock, Trina pasted a "Made in
France" label on the bottom of a Noah's ark, and leaned back in
her chair with a long sigh of relief. She had just finished a large
Christmas order for Uncle Oelbermann, and there was nothing else she
could do that morning. The bed had not yet been made, nor had the
breakfast things been washed. Trina hesitated for a moment, then put her
chin in the air indifferently.

"Bah!" she said, "let them go till this afternoon. I don't care WHEN
the room is put to rights, and I know Mac don't." She determined that
instead of making the bed or washing the dishes she would go and call
on Miss Baker on the floor below. The little dressmaker might ask her
to stay to lunch, and that would be something saved, as the dentist had
announced his intention that morning of taking a long walk out to the
Presidio to be gone all day.

But Trina rapped on Miss Baker's door in vain that morning. She was
out. Perhaps she was gone to the florist's to buy some geranium seeds.
However, Old Grannis's door stood a little ajar, and on hearing Trina at
Miss Baker's room, the old Englishman came out into the hall.

"She's gone out," he said, uncertainly, and in a half whisper, "went
out about half an hour ago. I--I think she went to the drug store to get
some wafers for the goldfish."

"Don't you go to your dog hospital any more, Mister Grannis?" said
Trina, leaning against the balustrade in the hall, willing to talk a
moment.

Old Grannis stood in the doorway of his room, in his carpet slippers and
faded corduroy jacket that he wore when at home.

"Why--why," he said, hesitating, tapping his chin thoughtfully. "You see
I'm thinking of giving up the little hospital."

"Giving it up?"

"You see, the people at the book store where I buy my pamphlets have
found out--I told them of my contrivance for binding books, and one of
the members of the firm came up to look at it. He offered me quite a sum
if I would sell him the right of it--the--patent of it--quite a sum. In
fact--in fact--yes, quite a sum, quite." He rubbed his chin tremulously
and looked about