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Updated: May 15, 2025
"Where did they get the money?" asked Fred, his brow darkening. "I don't know," was Bert's rejoinder. "But they must be able to raise money all right, for Driggs has the canoe down at his yard, and he has promised it to them in a few days." This news came like a slap in the face to the lawyer's son.
"No; but you got a little water into your lungs," responded one of the girls. "I heard Mr. Driggs tell Dick Prescott that, as nearly as they could guess, you opened your mouth a trifle just before Dick and Dave reached you and freed you from that awful trap. Mr. Driggs said that if you had been under water two minutes longer there would have been a different story to tell."
Yet it is not improbable that all these tales were insecurely based upon a single instance wherein one Starling Driggs, believing himself to stand in urgent need of a blessing, had offered to pay Uncle John for the service in vinegar.
Hiram Driggs held out his hand as smilingly as ever, and Fred took it in a flabby grasp, feeling as though he were going to faint. Then without a word Ripley slunk out of the office, while Driggs gazed after him still smiling. "The mean scoundrel!" panted Fred, as he hurried away, his knees trembling under him.
"Then your father will want to know something about it," Driggs went on. "He's a man of an inquiring turn of mind. Let's run up to his office together and ask him." "No, no, no!" urged Fred, his face growing paler. "Then why were you here last night?" "I wasn't here," protested the boy. "Perhaps I can tell you why you were here," Driggs went on, never losing his affable smile.
What was his name?" "The auctioneer's name? Caswell," Dick answered. "I'll make a note of that name," said Driggs, drawing out notebook and pencil, "and keep away from any auction that has a man named Caswell on the quarter-deck. Now, boys, what do you want to know about this canoe that your eyes don't tell you?" "About how much would it cost us to fix her?" asked Prescott.
"We wouldn't leave here anyway, while there's a chance that the high school boys can get their canoe back to the surface of the water. You needn't wait, Mr. Morton. When we're ready we can walk the rest of the way." "I don't say that I can surely raise the canoe," Mr. Driggs made haste to state, "or that it will be worth the trouble if we do raise it.
But would it be square business, after you young men have trusted me with your business secret as to where bark can be had for nothing?" That was a ruggedly honest way of putting it that impressed Dick & Co. "I'll tell you what you -might do, Mr. Driggs," hinted Tom Reade. "You might lend us a grindstone, if you have one to spare.
Dick glanced at his chums, who looked rather dumbfounded. Then he picked up the bills with an uneasy feeling. "Thank you, then," young Prescott continued. "But there is one little point overlooked, Mr. Driggs. You did the canoe for us at cost, though your price to any other customer would have been thirty dollars." "Oh, we'll let it go at that," Driggs suggested readily.
I'll speak to Driggs about it as soon as I go back, and you may expect to see on the front page of the 'Mercury' something like this: 'I, Horace Clay, physician of the village of Millford, hereby warn the public I will not be responsible for my wife's debts."
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