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Cooper, James A.

"Cap'n Abe, Storekeeper"


It was like a scene set for a play--for the taking of a film, perhaps.
The whimsical thought came to Louise that the director had just
shouted: "Get set!" and would immediately add: "Action! Camera! Go!"
"Course," Perry Baker drawled, "I sent it to Boston as consigner,
myself; so when the chest warn't called for within a reasonable time
they shipped it back to me, knowin' I was agent. Funny Cap'n Abe
didn't show up for to claim it."
Cap'n Amazon, grim as a gargoyle, leaned upon the counter and stared
the expressman out of countenance, saying nothing. Perry shifted
uneasily in the doorway. The captain's silence and his stare were
becoming irksome to bear.
"Well!" he finally ejaculated, "that's how 'tis. I'd ha' waited
till--till Cap'n Abe come home--if he ever _does_ come; but my wife,
Huldy, got fidgety. She reads the papers, and she's got it into her
head there's something wrong 'bout the old chest. She dreamed 'bout
it. An' ye know, when a woman gets to dreamin' she'll drag her
anchors, no matter what the bottom is.


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