I know that young fellow your friend is
playing with, and I wish he were in better company than
he is. I think I know enough of the usages of modern
society to `interview' him and his companion, though
times have changed since I was of your age in that
regard. Come here in an hour, or give me rather more,
come here at half-past two, and we will see what we
will see."
So Tom went round to the Navy Department, and here he
found the faithful Eben--faithful to him, though utterly
faithless as to any success in the special quest which
was making the entertainment of the Christmas holiday.
Vainly did Tom repeat to him his formula,--
"If the Navy did the work, the Navy has the vouchers."
"My dear boy," Eben Ricketts repeated a hundred
times, "though the Navy did the work, the Navy did not
provide the pork and beans; it did not arrange in advance
for the landing, least of all did it buy the greasers.
I will look where you like, for love of your father and
you; but that file of vouchers is not here, never was
here, and never will be found here."
An assistant like this is not an encouraging
companion or adviser.
And, in short, the vouchers were not found in the
Navy Department, in that particular midday search. At
twenty-five minutes past two Tom gave it up unwillingly,
bade Eben Ricketts good-by, washed from his hands the
accretions of coal-dust, which will gather even on
letter-boxes in Navy Departments, and ran across in front
of the President's House, to Willard's.
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