It's the safer way--the only safe way--an' there'll be
the fatter sharin's. Now you know--hey?--why Branscome's givin' me
lessons in navigation."
He chuckled, and was moving off mysteriously to a back doorway behind
the dresser, but halted and came back to the table beside which I
stood, making no motion to follow him.
"Look ye here, Brooks," said be. "If there's anything you don't get
the hang of--anything that takes ye aback, so to speak, in what I'm
tellin' you--you just hitch on an' trust to old Dan Coffin; to old
Dan, as'll do for you more than ever your godfathers an' godmothers
did at your baptism. You'll pick up a full breeze as you go on.
Man, the treasure's there! Man, I've handled it, or enough of it to
keep you in a coach-an'-six, with nothing to do but loll on cushions
for the rest o' your days, an' pick your teeth at the crowd.
And look ye here." He waved a hand around the room. "I'm old Danny
Coffin, ain't I? poor old drunken Danny Coffin, eh? Yet cast an eye
about ye. Nice fittin's, ben't they? Hitch down my coat off the peg
there; feel the cloth of it; take it between finger and thumb.
Ay, I don't live upon air, nor keep house an' fixtures upon nothin'
at all. There--if you want more proof!" He dived a hand into his
trouser-pocket, and held out a golden coin under my nose.
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