friend's speculations occasionally betrayed him.

"Here it is, sir," said the Colonel. "I'll come down upon that crittur
at Detroit, where I hear he's a-goin', and flatter him by saying that he
was all right about _you_."

"Indeed!" said Layton, laughing.

"Yes, sir," said the other, gravely. "I'll say to him, 'Stranger, you
_are_ a wide-awake 'un, that's a fact.' He'll rise to _that_, like a
ground-shark to a leg of pork,--see if he don't,--and he 'll go on to
ask about _you_; that will give me the opportunity to give a sketch of
myself, and a more simple, guileless sort of bein' you 've not often
heerd of than I 'll turn out to be. Yes, sir, I 'm one as suspects no
ill of anybody, jest out of the pureness of my own heart. When we get on
to a little more intimacy, I mean to show him twenty thousand dollars
I 've got by me, and ask his advice about investin' 'em. I guess pretty
nigh what he'll say: 'Give 'em over to me.' Well, I 'll take a bit
of time to consider about that. There will be, in consequence, more
intimacy and more friendship atween us: but arter he's seen the money,
he 'll not leave me; human natur' could n't do _that!_"

"Shall I tell you fairly," said Layton, "that I not only don't like your
scheme, but that I think it will not repay you?"

"Well, sir," said Quackinboss, drawing himself up, "whenever you see
_me_ baitin' a rat-trap, I don't expect you 'll say, 'Colonel, ain't
that mean? Ain't _you_ ashamed of yourself to entice that poor varmint
there to his ruin? Why don't you explain to him that if he wants that
morsel of fried bacon, it will cost him pretty dear?'"

"You forget that you're begging the question. You're assuming, all this
time, that this man is a rogue and a cheat."

"I am, sir," said he, firmly, "for it's not at this time o' day Shaver
Quackinboss has to learn life. All the pepperin' and lemon-squeezin' in
the world won't make a toad taste like a terrapin: that crittur's gold
chains don't impose upon _me!_ You remember that he was n't aboard
four-and-twenty hours when I said, 'That sheep's mangy.'"

"Perhaps I like your plan the less because it separates us," said
Layton, who now perceived that the Colonel seemed to smart under
anything that reflected on his acuteness.

"That's jest what galls me too," said he, frankly. "It's been all
sunshine in my life, since we 've been together. All the book-learnin'
you 've got has stolen into your nature so gradually as to make part of