"Cal., when are you going to Europe?"
"Well--I hadn't thought of that. When are you?"
"In the Spring."
"Going to be gone all summer?"
"All summer! I shall remain there three years."
"No--but are you in earnest?"
"Indeed I am."
"I will go along too."
"Why of course you will."
"What part of Europe shall you go to?"
"All parts. France, England, Germany--Spain, Italy, Switzerland, Syria,
Greece, Palestine, Arabia, Persia, Egypt--all over--everywhere."
"I'm agreed."
"All right."
"Won't it be a swell trip!"
"We'll spend forty or fifty thousand dollars trying to make it one,
anyway."
Another long pause.
"Higbie, we owe the butcher six dollars, and he has been threatening to
stop our--"
"Hang the butcher!"
"Amen."
And so it went on. By three o'clock we found it was no use, and so we
got up and played cribbage and smoked pipes till sunrise. It was my week
to cook. I always hated cooking--now, I abhorred it.
The news was all over town. The former excitement was great--this one
was greater still. I walked the streets serene and happy. Higbie said
the foreman had been offered two hundred thousand dollars for his third
of the mine. I said I would like to see myself selling for any such
price. My ideas were lofty. My figure was a million. Still, I honestly
believe that if I had been offered it, it would have had no other effect
than to make me hold off for more.
I found abundant enjoyment in being rich.
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