in and badly in need of a hairdresser's
services. If the animal had possessed whiskers and could have tugged at
them Thankful was sure it would have done it.

Solomon tugged at his own whiskers almost constantly during that
forenoon. He and Mrs. Barnes visited the "Captain Abner place" and
Solomon inspected every inch of its exterior. For some reason or
other he absolutely refused to go inside. His conversation during the
inspection was, for the most part, sniffs and grunts, and it was not
until it was ended and they stood together at the gate, that he spoke to
the point, and then only because his companion insisted.

"Well!" said Thankful.

Mr. Cobb "weeded."

"Eh?" he said.

"That's what I say--eh? What are you goin' to do about that mortgage,
Mr. Cobb?"

More weeding. Then: "Waal, I--I don't cal'late to want to be
unreasonable nor nothin', but I ain't real keen about takin' no mortgage
on that property; not myself, I ain't."

"Well, it is yourself I'm askin' to take it. So you won't, hey? All
right; that's all I wanted to know."

"Now--now--now, hold on! Hold on! I ain't sayin' I WON'T take it. I--I'd
like to be accommodatin', 'specially to a relation. But--"

"Never mind the relation business. I found out what you think
of relations afore you found out I was one. And I ain't askin'
accommodation. This is just plain business, seems to me. Will you let me
have two thousand dollars on a mortgage on this place?"

Mr. Cobb fidgeted. "I couldn't let you have that much," he said. "I
couldn't. I--I--" he wrenched the next sentence loose after what seemed
a violent effort, "I might let you have half of it--a thousand, say."

But Thankful refused to say a thousand. That was ridiculous, she
declared. By degrees, and a hundred at a time, Solomon raised his offer
to fifteen hundred. This being the sum Mrs. Barnes had considered in the
first place--and having asked for the two thousand merely because of her
judgment of human nature--she announced that she would think over the
offer. Then came the question of time. Here Mr. Cobb was firm. Three
years--two years--he would not consider. At last he announced that
he would take a one-year mortgage on the Barnes property for fifteen
hundred dollars; and that was all he would do.

"And I wouldn't do that for nobody else," he declared. "You bein' my
relation I don't know's it ain't my duty as a perfessin' Christian
to--to help you out. I hadn't ought to afford it, but I'm