"
"I have," promptly. "Or, if I ain't got enough with me I can get more.
How much? Just you say how much you think he'll need and I'll have
it for you inside of a couple of hours. If money's all you want--why,
that's nothin'."
Thankful heard little, apparently, of this prodigal offer. She took up
the letter.
"Cap'n Bangs," said she, "you remember I told you, one time when we were
talkin' together, that I had a brother--Jedediah, his name was--who used
to live with me after my husband was drowned?"
"Yes. I remember. You said he'd run off to go gold-diggin' in the
Klondike or somewheres. You said he was dead."
"I thought he must be. I gave him up long ago, because I was sartin sure
if he wasn't dead he'd have written me, askin' me to let him come back.
I knew he'd never be able to get along all by himself. But he isn't
dead. He's alive and he's written me now. Here's his letter. Read it,
please."
The captain took the letter and slowly read it through. It was a
rambling, incoherent epistle, full of smudges where words had been
scratched out and rewritten, but a pitiful appeal nevertheless. Jedediah
Cahoon had evidently had a hard time since the day when, after declaring
his intention never to return until "loaded down with money," he had
closed the door of his sister's house at South Middleboro and gone out
into the snowstorm and the world. His letter contained few particulars.
He had wandered far, even as far as his professed destination, the
Klondike, but, wherever he had been, ill luck was there to meet him.
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