He wore one of them long coats that flaps around your legs, and his pants was a different color, with stripes into them, and his vest was white, with a pound of watch-chain strung across the front of it—and he had on a stovepipe hat. He wore shiny shoes with cloth things covering the tops of them. At first I thought his socks were coming down, but I found out they were things folks call spats. There was a sparkly stone in his tie that I guessed was a diamond. I turned to Catty. “There,” says I. “You want your Dad to look respectable. I’ll bet you can’t beat that critter.” “He’s consid’able dressed up,” says Catty, without a smile. “Bet he’s rich,” says I. “Bet he wants folks to _think_ he is, anyhow,” says Catty. “What d’you mean?” says I. “I dunno,” says Catty, “but that feller hain’t my idee of the way a reg’lar rich business man looks.... Ever go fishin’ and fix a worm on a hook so’s it looks all-fired splendid—fat and twisty and better ’n any worm ever looked if it was left to itself?” “Yes,” says I. “To fool the fish,” says Catty. “Bait.... That’s the way The Proprietor of the Earth there looks to me.” “You’re talkin’ through your hat,” says I. “He looks jest like pictures of bankers in story-books.” “Hain’t read many story-books,” says he. “Let’s be moggin’ back,” We walked back, though we could have rode on the seat with Pazzy Bills if we had wanted to. Pazzy always lets the kids ride with him. On our way we stopped at the hotel, being kind of curious about The Proprietor. There was quite a few men on the hotel porch and in the office, talking about the man that jest came, and looking at the register to find out his name. His name was Arthur Peabody Kinderhook, of New York City. The hotel clerk was looking kind of flabbergasted. “Yes, sir,” he was saying. “That there man he walked right up to the desk and he says, says he ‘Gimme your best suite with a bath.’ “‘Sweet’? says I. “‘Suite,’ says he. ‘Bedroom, parlor, dressin’-room, bath.’ “‘You want the whole kaboodle of them rooms?’ says I. ‘All for yourself?’ “‘I do,’ says he. “‘I kin give ’em to you,’ says I, ‘but I hain’t never give nobody a bath yet. You’ll have to take your own bath.’ “He kind of laughed at that and said he calc’lated to if I would supply the bath-room. “‘Bath-room,’ says I. ‘D’you mean one of them new-fangled affairs with a tub a body kin lay down in, and with water squirtin’ hot and cold out of nozzles?’ “‘Precisely,’ says he. “‘Hain’t got none,’ says I. ‘But if you need a bath bad we kin set in a washtub f’r you and one of the boys ’ll fetch you a kittle of hot water.’ “He laughed again. ‘Wait, my friend,’ says he. ‘You’ll have bathtubs before I’m through with you, and many other comforts and luxuries you never dreamed of.’ “‘Do tell,’ says I. ‘Goin’ to stay long in our midst?’ “‘I am thinking,’ said he, ‘of establishing a large branch of my principal industry here. I shall be with you for some time.’ “‘Livin’ in this hotel?’