Hence Mr. Green’s underwriting expedition and the proposition to Mary as the representative of Hamilton and Company.

Mary accepted, of course.  She was very grateful and said so.

“I don’t know how to thank you, Mr. Green.  I can’t promise anything, but if trying hard will win, I can promise that,” she said.

“That’s all right, that’s all right.  I know you’ll try, and I think you’ll succeed.  Now, why don’t you go up and pick out some of those summer goods?  You don’t need them yet, and you needn’t pay for them yet, but now is the time to select.  Give my regards to your uncles when you see them and tell them I wish them luck.  I may be motoring down the Cape this summer and if I do I shall drop in on you and them.”

Mary had news to tell when she reached South Harniss.  It was listened to with attention, if not entirely in silence.  Captain Shadrach’s ejaculations of “You don’t say!” “I want to know!” and “Jumpin’ fire, how you talk!” served as punctuation marks during the narration.  When she had finished her story, she said: 

“And now, Uncle Zoeth and Uncle Shad—­now that you’ve heard the whole of it, and know what my plan is, what do you think of it?”

Both answers were characteristic.  Zoeth drew a long breath.

“The Almighty sent you to us, Mary-’Gusta,” he vowed.  “There was a time a little spell ago when I begun to think He’d pretty nigh deserted us.  I was almost discouraged and it shook my trust—­it shook my trust.  But now I can see He was just tryin’ us out and in His good time He sent you to haul us off the shoals.  He’ll do it, too; I know it and I’ll thank Him tonight on my knees.”

Shadrach shook his head.  “By fire!” he cried.  “Mary-’Gusta, I always said you was a wonder.  You’ve given us a chance to get clear of the breakers, anyhow, and that’s somethin’ we’d never have done ourselves.  Now, if you can collect that money from Jeremiah Clifford I’ll—­I’ll—­I swan to man I’ll believe anything’s possible, even Jonah’s swallowin’ the whale.”

“Oh, Shadrach!” protested his partner.  “If you wouldn’t be so irreverent!”

“All right, I’ll behave.  But it’s just as I say:  if Mary-’Gusta can get Jerry Clifford to pay up I’ll swallow Jonah and the whale, too.  ’Twas Moses that hit the rock and the water gushed out, wa’n’t it?  Um—­hm!  Well, that was somethin’ of a miracle, but strikin’ Jerry Clifford for ten cents and gettin’ it would be a bigger one.  Why, that feller’s got fists like—­like one of those sensitive plants my mother used to have in the settin’-room window when I was a boy.  You touch a leaf of one of those plants and ’twould shrivel up tight.  Jerry’s fists are that way—­touch one of ’em with a nickel and ’twill shut up, but not until the nickel’s inside.  No, sir!  Ho, ho!”

“If you knew all this, Uncle Shad,” suggested Mary, “why in the world did you sell Mr. Clifford at all?  If he wouldn’t pay, why sell him?”