"Tough times with you marchants, now, ain't they?" sez I, a looking over the top of the paper. "Very," sez he, a mending his pen. "It's as much as we can du to make both eends meet afore the bank's shut up days. Mr. Beebe's out a shinning now." "A what?" sez I. "A shinning," says he--"borrowing money to take up his own notes with, and if he don't get it, I don't know what we _shall du_." "Oh!" sez I to myself, "this is the new partner, Mr. Co; he must have a good chance of money in the consarn, or he wouldn't feel so oneasy." "We was doing a beautiful business," sez he, a shaking his head, "till some of the banks stopped specie payments. I wish they'd a been sunk." "No," sez I, "that ain't fair, but it's human natur, I s'pose to give banks as well as people, a helping kick when they're going down hill. I don't understand much of these things, Mr. Co." "My name isn't Co," sez he, a staring; "it's Smith." "What," sez I, "have they got another in the company?" "No," sez he, kinder coloring up; "I'm the assistant bookkeeper." I couldn't but jest keep from giving a long whistle right out, the stuck up varmint! "Wal," sez I, arter a minit, "Mr. Smith, let me give you one piece of advice--don't be so ready to say _we_, and to talk over your employers' business with strangers next time. Such things do no good any way, but they may do a good deal of harm. It's the duty of a clark, among us, to attend to that he's paid for, and if he attends to much else, we purty ginerally find out that he ain't good for much in the long run." You never saw a feller look so mean as he did when I said this; he turned all manner of colors, and acted mad enough to eat me. I didn't seem to mind him, but took up a newspaper and begun to read, jest as if he wasn't in the room; and by-am-by I got so deep in the paper, that I forgot all about him or cousin Beebe either.