Captains Courageous | Page 9

in spite of himself. "My
father hasn't any use for ponies. When he wants to ride he takes his
car."
"Haow? Lobster-car?"
"No. His own private car, of course. You've seen a private car some
time in your life?"
"Slatin Beeman he hez one," said Dan, cautiously. "I saw her at the
Union Depot in Boston, with three niggers hoggin' her run.", (Dan
meant cleaning the windows.) "But Slatin Beeman he owns 'baout
every railroad on Long Island, they say, an' they say he's bought 'baout
ha'af Noo Hampshire an' run a line fence around her, an' filled her up
with lions an' tigers an' bears an' buffalo an' crocodiles an' such all.
Slatin Beeman he's a millionaire. I've seen his car. Yes?"
"Well, my father's what they call a multi-millionaire, and he has two
private cars. One's named for me, the 'Harvey', and one for my mother,
the 'Constance'."
"Hold on," said Dan. "Dad don't ever let me swear, but I guess you can.
'Fore we go ahead, I want you to say hope you may die if you're lyin'."
"Of course," said Harvey.
"The ain't 'niff. Say, 'Hope I may die if I ain't speaking' truth."'
"Hope I may die right here," said Harvey, "if every word I've spoken

isn't the cold truth."
"Hundred an' thirty-four dollars an' all?" said Dan. "I heard ye talkin' to
Dad, an' I ha'af looked you'd be swallered up, same's Jonah."
Harvey protested himself red in the face. Dan was a shrewd young
person along his own lines, and ten minutes' questioning convinced him
that Harvey was not lying--much. Besides, he had bound himself by the
most terrible oath known to boyhood, and yet he sat, alive, with a
red-ended nose, in the scuppers, recounting marvels upon marvels.
"Gosh!" said Dan at last from the very bottom of his soul when Harvey
had completed an inventory of the car named in his honour. Then a grin
of mischievous delight overspread his broad face. "I believe you,
Harvey. Dad's made a mistake fer once in his life."
"He has, sure," said Harvey, who was meditating an early revenge.
"He'll be mad clear through. Dad jest hates to be mistook in his
jedgments." Dan lay back and slapped his thigh. "Oh, Harvey, don't you
spile the catch by lettin' on."
"I don't want to be knocked down again. I'll get even with him,
though."
"Never heard any man ever got even with dad. But he'd knock ye down
again sure. The more he was mistook the more he'd do it. But
gold-mines and pistols --"
"I never said a word about pistols," Harvey cut in, for he was on his
oath.
"Thet's so; no more you did. Two private cars, then, one named fer you
an' one fer her; an' two hundred dollars a month pocket-money, all
knocked into the scuppers fer not workin' fer ten an' a ha'af a month!
It's the top haul o' the season." He exploded with noiseless chuckles.
"Then I was right?" said Harvey, who thought he had found a

sympathiser.
"You was wrong; the wrongest kind o' wrong! You take right hold an'
pitch in 'longside o' me, or you'll catch it, an' I'll catch it fer backin' you
up. Dad always gives me double helps 'cause I'm his son, an' he hates
favourin' folk. 'Guess you're kinder mad at dad. I've been that way time
an' again. But dad's a mighty jest man; all the fleet says so."
"Looks like justice, this, don't it?" Harvey pointed to his outraged nose.
"Thet's nothin'. Lets the shore blood outer you. Dad did it for yer health.
Say, though, I can't have dealin's with a man that thinks me or dad or
any one on the 'We're Here's' a thief. We ain't any common wharf-end
crowd by any manner o' means. We're fishermen, an' we've shipped
together for six years an' more. Don't you make any mistake on that! I
told ye dad don't let me swear. He calls 'em vain oaths, and pounds me;
but ef I could say what you said 'baout your pap an' his fixin's, I'd say
that 'baout your dollars. I dunno what was in your pockets when I dried
your kit, fer I didn't look to see; but I'd say, using the very same words
ez you used jest now, neither me nor dad -- an' we was the only two
that teched you after you was brought aboard -- knows anythin' 'baout
the money. Thet's my say. Naow?"
The bloodletting had certainly cleared Harvey's brain, and maybe the
loneliness of the sea had something to do with it. "That's all right," he
said. Then he looked down confusedly. "'Seems to me that for a fellow
just saved from drowning I haven't been over and above