“I finished my breakfast and washed up the dishes.  He come in by and by.  He hadn’t had no dinner nor supper, you see, and the salt air gives most folks an almighty appetite.

“‘Say,’ he says, ‘I’ve been thinkin’.  It’s usual in the stock and provision market to deal on a margin.  Suppose I pay you a one per cent margin now and—­’

“‘All right,’ says I, cheerful.  ’Then I’ll give you a slip of paper sayin’ that you’ve bought such and such slices of pork and hunks of johnnycake and I’m carryin’ ’em for you on a margin.  Of course there ain’t no delivery of the goods now because—­’

“‘Humph!’ he interrupts, sour.  ’You seem to know more’n I thought you did.  Now are you goin’ to be decent and make me a fair price or ain’t you?’

“‘Can’t sell under the latest quotations,’ says I.  ’That’s five now; and spot cash.’

“‘But hang it all!’ he says, ’I haven’t got money enough with me.  Think I carry a national bank around in my clothes?’

“‘You carry a Wellmouth Bank check book,’ says I, ’because I see it in your jacket pocket last night when I was dryin’ your duds.  I’ll take a check.’

“He started to say somethin’ and then stopped.  After a spell he seemed to give in all to once.

“‘Very good,’ he says.  ’You get my breakfast ready and I’ll make out the check.’

“That breakfast cost him twenty-five dollars; thirty really, because he added another five for an extry cup of coffee.  I told him to make the check payable to ‘Bearer,’ as ’twas quicker to write than ‘Solomon.’

“He had two more meals that day and at bedtime I had his checks amountin’ to ninety-five dollars.  The fog stayed with us all the time and nobody come to pick us up.  And the next mornin’s outlook was just as bad, bein’ a drizzlin’ rain and a high wind.  The mainland beach was in sight but that’s all except salt water and rain.

“He was surprisin’ly cheerful all that day, eatin’ like a horse and givin’ up his meal checks without a whimper.  If things had been different from what they was I’d have felt like a mean sneak thief.  Bein’ as they was, I counted up the hundred and ten I’d made that day without a pinch of conscience.

“This was a Wednesday.  On Thursday, the third day of our Robinson Crusoe business, the weather was still thick, though there was signs of clearin’.  Fatty come to me after breakfast—­which cost him thirty-five, payable, as usual, to ’Bearer’—­with almost a grin on his big face.

“‘Berry,’ he says, ’I owe you an apology.  I thought you was a green Rube, like the rest down here, but you’re as sharp as they make ’em.  I ain’t the man to squeal when I get let in on a bad deal, and the chap who can work me for a sucker is entitled to all he can make.  But this pay-as-you-go business is too slow and troublesome.  What’ll you take for the rest of the grub in the locker there, spot cash?  Be white, and make a fair price.’