“We’re damned rich,” he added. I shook hands all round a second time. “I’ll go to sea no more—unless—there’s no sayin’—a private yacht, maybe—wi’ a small an’ handy auxiliary.” “It’s not enough for _that_,” said Janet. “We’re fair rich—well-to-do, but no more. A new gown for church, and one for the theatre. We’ll have it made west.” “How much is it?” I asked. “Twenty-five thousand pounds.” I drew a long breath. “An’ I’ve been earnin’ twenty-five an’ twenty pound a month!” The last words came away with a roar, as though the wide world was conspiring to beat him down. “All this time I’m waiting,” I said. “I know nothing since last September. Was it left you?” They laughed aloud together. “It was left,” said McPhee, choking. “Ou, ay, it was left. That’s vara good. Of course it was left. Janet, d’ ye note that? It was left. Now if you’d put _that_ in your pamphlet it would have been vara jocose. It _was_ left.” He slapped his thigh and roared till the wine quivered in the decanter. The Scotch are a great people, but they are apt to hang over a joke too long, particularly when no one can see the point but themselves. “When I rewrite my pamphlet I’ll put it in, McPhee. Only I must know something more first.” McPhee thought for the length of half a cigar, while Janet caught my eye and led it round the room to one new thing after another—the new vine-pattern carpet, the new chiming rustic clock between the models of the Colombo outrigger-boats, the new inlaid sideboard with a purple cut-glass flower-stand, the fender of gilt and brass, and last, the new black-and-gold piano. “In October o’ last year the Board sacked me,” began McPhee. “In October o’ last year the _Breslau_ came in for winter overhaul. She’d been runnin’ eight months—two hunder an’ forty days—an’ I was three days makin’ up my indents, when she went to dry-dock. All told, mark you, it was this side o’ three hunder pound—to be preceese, two hunder an’ eighty-six pound four shillings. There’s not another man could ha’ nursed the _Breslau_ for eight months to that tune. Never again—never again! They may send their boats to the bottom, for aught I care.” “There’s no need,” said Janet, softly. “We’re done wi’ Holdock, Steiner & Chase.”