A bottle rolled out, and smashed in a
hissing froth of champagne.
"Plenty more," he cried, rejoicing. "That shows ye how much _I_ care!
Oho!" Suddenly he turned from this destruction, and facing Heywood,
began mysteriously to exult over him. "Old fool and his earnings, eh?
Fixed ideas, eh? 'No good,' says you. 'That cock won't fight,' says you.
'Let it alone.'--Ho-ho! What price fixed ideas now?"
The eyes of his young friend widened in unbelief.
"No," he cried, with a start: "you haven't?"
The captain seized both hands again, and took on--for his height--a
Roman stateliness.
"I have." He nodded solemnly. "Bar sells, I have. No more, now.
We'll--be-George, we'll announce it, at the banquet! Announce, that's
the word. First time in _my_ life: announce!"
Heywood suddenly collapsed on a sack, and laughed himself into abject
silence.
"Awfully glad, old chap," he at last contrived to say, and again
choked. The captain looked down at the shaking body with a singular,
benign, and fatherly smile.
"A funny world, ain't it?" he declared sagely. "I've known this boy a
long time," he explained to Rudolph.
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