What I did, I should have done if you had not come. To be
sure I did spend a few minutes preparing your room. I will charge
you seven twenty-fourths of a cent for that, thus making your bill
twenty-three cents--even money."
"I cannot gainsay reasoning like yours, madam," he said, and he
took a quarter from a very fat old pocket-book, and handed it to
her. She gravely gave him two cents change, and then taking the
bill, receipted it, and handed it back to him.
We were sorry to part with our guest, for he was evidently a good
fellow. I walked with him a little way up the road, and got him to
let me copy his bill in my memorandum-book. The original, he said,
he would always keep.
A day or two after the artist's departure, we were standing on the
front piazza. We had had a late breakfast--consequent upon a long
tramp the day before--and had come out to see what sort of a day it
was likely to be. We had hardly made up our minds on the subject
when the morning stage came up at full speed and stopped at our
gate.
"Hello!" cried the driver. He was not our driver. He was a tall
man in high boots, and had a great reputation as a manager of
horses--so Danny Carson told me afterward. There were two drivers
on the line, and each of them made one trip a day, going up one day
in the afternoon, and down the next day in the morning.
I went out to see what this driver wanted.
"Can't you give my passengers breakfast?" he asked.
"Why, no!" I exclaimed, looking at the stage loaded inside and out.
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