“Wolf, I am about ready to buy this boat, if you are about ready to sell it,” said Tom Walton, as we were sailing up the lake in the Belle.
“I’m quite ready to sell it to you, Tom,” I replied.
“You ought to own her by this time, Tom,” added Waddie Wimpleton, who was one of the party.
We were going up the lake to have a good time; in other words, it was vacation with me. When Tom Walton spoke, I was thinking of the events of the past, as the sail-boat glided swiftly over the clear waters of Lake Ucayga. I was the general agent of the Union Line, which now included the Lake Shore Railroad and the Ucayga Steamboat. The two millionnaires, who had fixed their residences on opposite sides of the lake, at the Narrows, where it is only one mile wide, had been the most bitter enemies for years, taking up the hatchet after a long period of the most intimate and friendly relations. Major Toppleton had built the Lake Shore Railroad as a plaything for the students of the Institute established on his side of the lake, in order to give them a thorough and practical knowledge of railway business. The idea had grown on his hands till the road had become a very important channel of travel. Buying up the stock of the old steamers on the lake, he had obtained the control of them, and ran them in connection with the railroad. This movement gave Middleport, on the major’s side of the lake, a very great advantage over Centreport, where Colonel Wimpleton resided.
Then the two great men became rivals for the business of the lake; and the colonel built a large and splendid steamer, to run in opposition to the railroad, which, by its great speed and elegant accommodations, had carried the day against the railroad. The students of the Wimpleton Institute were formed into a company, and nominally managed the affairs of the steamer, thus obtaining an insight into the method of conducting business in stock companies. I had been a kind of shuttlecock between the rival magnates, and had been successively employed and discharged by each. The war between the two sides of the lake had extended to the families of the principal parties, and the inhabitants of the large towns in which they lived. The two sons of the great men had been particularly hostile; but, having mended their ways, and, from vicious, overbearing, tyrannical young men, becoming kind, gentle, and noble, they buried the hatchet, and their relations were pleasant and friendly. By their indirect efforts, with some help from me, the feud between the fathers had been healed, and they were now warm personal friends. The railroad and steamboat lines had been united, and were now running in connection with each other.
I am not disposed to say much about my own agency in bringing about this happy state of things, though I had labored patiently and persistently for years to accomplish the result. I was happy in the achievement, and not inclined to apportion the credit of it among those who had brought it about, except to award a very large share of it to the sons of the two magnates. The two lines had been running in connection about two months. As the general superintendent of the united line, I had gone over the entire route daily until everything worked to my own satisfaction, as well as to that of the traveling public. As captain of the steamer, I had been constantly employed all winter, and I felt disposed to play a few days. It was vacation at both the Institutes, and Tommy Toppleton had gone to one of the great watering-places with his father and mother, though the time fixed for their return had arrived. Waddie Wimpleton had accepted an invitation to spend a few days on a cruise with me up the lake. We intended to live on board of the Belle, and spend the time in fishing, sailing, and rambling through the wild region.
I had bought the Belle at auction, at a time when I was out of employment, having been discharged by Major Toppleton from my situation as engineer on the Lake Shore Railroad. She had cost me a very small sum, compared with her value, and I intended to make my living by taking out parties in her. But, as I was very soon appointed to the command of the steamer, I employed Tom Walton to run her for me; and he paid me a portion of the receipts. He had done well for himself, and well for me, in her. Tom was a very honest, industrious, and capable fellow, and supported his mother and the rest of the family by his labor. I had told him I would sell the Belle to him at a fair price, any time when he wished to buy her. I had been rather surprised that he did not avail himself of this offer, for my share of the earnings of the boat had already paid me double the amount she had cost me.
“I think of going into the general navigation business,” said Tom, with one of his good-natured laughs; “and if I can buy her, I will do so.”
“You can, Tom,” I replied.
“My mother has been sick a good deal for the last two years, and it took about all I could make to take care of the family, or I should have bought her before.”
“I’ll trust you, Tom,” I added.
“I don’t want anybody to trust me, except to keep the folks from starving. I didn’t mean to buy that boat till I had money enough to pay for her. I’ve got a little ahead now.”
“How much have you, Tom?” I asked.
“I haven’t enough to bust the Middleport Bank yet. You’ve used me first rate, Wolf, and I don’t mean to cheat you on this boat. After all, whether I buy her or not rather depends on what you ask for her.”
“You shall have her for what she will bring at auction.”
“What will she bring at auction?”
“I don’t know.”
“I don’t think I can buy her, then, for I know a man in town who will start the bidding at one hundred and fifty.”
“Do you? Well, I had no idea any one would give that for her,” I replied.
I saw that Tom was troubled, though he still kept his face alive with his usual smile. I would have given him the boat at once, only the offer to do so would wound his pride and hurt his feelings, for, poor as he was, he had the instincts of a gentleman.
“I shall make money by buying the boat, Wolf, and I want her badly, but not enough to run in debt for her,” added he.
“Suppose we do as Major Toppleton and Colonel Wimpleton did on the steamers.”
“What’s that?”
“Mark.”
“I’m willing to mark; but I’m afraid I can’t hit your figures, Wolf, for the Belle is a valuable piece of property. I ought to know that, if no one else does.”
“You write what you are willing to give, and I will write what I am willing to take. If my figures are lower than yours, they shall be the price of the boat, and the trade is completed.”
“Your figures?”
“Yes.”
“Why not my figures, if they are higher than yours?”
“If you give all I ask, that’s enough. If my figures are higher than yours, we will split the difference,” I continued, handing him a pencil and paper.
“That’s fair, so far as I am concerned; but don’t you cheat yourself, Wolf,” replied Tom, taking the paper and making his figures upon it, after considerable hesitation.
“You needn’t worry about me, my dear fellow. Give your figures to Waddie. He shall stand between us,” I added, as I wrote my own valuation, and handed it to him.
“There is considerable difference in your estimates,” laughed Waddie. “What am I to do?—split the difference?”
“Not unless my figures are higher than Tom’s.”
“They are not, Wolf. Tom’s are a mile and a half higher than yours.”
“Then the boat is sold at my price,” I added.
“Cheap enough!” exclaimed Waddie.
“What are the figures?” asked Tom.
“You marked one hundred and fifty dollars, Tom, and Wolf marked fifty dollars. So the Belle is sold.”
“So am I,” said the skipper.
“Are you not satisfied?”
“No; I feel just as though I had been overreached. See here, Wolf Penniman; I didn’t mean to have you give me this boat.”
“I haven’t given her to you.”
“I supposed you would ask three or four hundred dollars for her.”
“I am satisfied, Tom. I have made money out of her, and now I get back all she cost me.”
“But don’t you think it’s an insult to the Belle to sell her for fifty dollars?” laughed Tom.
“If she does not complain, you need not.”
“Wolf, I don’t feel exactly right about it. I have a kind of an idea that you have taken pity on me, for a poor, miserable fellow as I am, and given me the boat.”
“No such thing, Tom!” I protested.
“Didn’t I say there was a man in town that would bid a hundred and fifty dollars on her if she was put up at auction?”
“I don’t know him, Tom; and I’m afraid he would not use her kindly. The Belle is yours.”
“I can afford to give you a hundred for her without busting the Middleport Bank. Don’t you think I’d better do it?”
“Certainly not, Tom. A trade is a trade.”
“But I feel just as though I had stolen her.”
“Don’t feel so, my dear fellow. I will give you a bill of sale when I can get something to write it with. It’s all right now, Tom. ‘Be virtuous and you will be happy,’ and your boat will sail all the faster for it.”
“I am happy, Wolf I have saved up about one hundred and fifty dollars. I thought that would almost buy the Belle. Now I’m just a hundred in. I’m going into the general navigation business, and I want some more boats, to let, and I’m lucky enough to have the capital to invest in them. I shall buy some row-boats, for there are lots of people that want to hire them.”
“I have no doubt you will do a good business letting boats, Tom. Rowing is a great art, and a healthy one. But have good boats. Don’t buy poor ones because they are cheap.”
“Not I, Wolf; my boats shall be first chop, ‘A, No. 1, prime.’ But I suppose you gentlemen want some dinner—don’t you?”
“We do want some dinner, Tom,” I replied. “I make a business of attending to that matter every day.”
“Exactly so, Wolf. That’s just what you thought the last time you thought so.”
“Eating dinner I have always found to be a healthy amusement, and I intend to follow it up as long as I live, and can get any dinner to eat,” I replied.
“You will always get it, Wolf, for you are a rich man now; and you will die worth a million, if you don’t die before you have a million. Now, if you will take the helm, you shall have a beefsteak and some baked potatoes, first chop, A, No. 1, prime, in about half an hour, more or less, but rather more than less.”
I took the tiller, and Tom went into the cuddy to prepare the meal. In half an hour, more or less, we had the beefsteak and baked potatoes, smoking hot, done to a turn, and just as nice as the best hotel in the country could furnish.