with capital; but I couldn't seem to bear the idea.
That paint was like my own blood to me. To have anybody
else concerned in it was like--well, I don't know what.
I saw it was the thing to do; but I tried to fight it off,
and I tried to joke it off. I used to say, 'Why didn't
you take a partner yourself, Persis, while I was away?'
And she'd say, 'Well, if you hadn't come back, I should,
Si.' Always DID like a joke about as well as any woman I
ever saw. Well, I had to come to it. I took a partner."
Lapham dropped the bold blue eyes with which he had been
till now staring into Bartley's face, and the reporter
knew that here was a place for asterisks in his interview,
if interviews were faithful. "He had money enough,"
continued Lapham, with a suppressed sigh; "but he didn't know
anything about paint. We hung on together for a year or two.
And then we quit."

"And he had the experience," suggested Bartley,
with companionable ease.

"I had some of the experience too," said Lapham,
with a scowl; and Bartley divined, through the freemasonry
of all who have sore places in their memories, that this
was a point which he must not touch again.

"And since that, I suppose, you've played it alone."

"I've played it alone."

"You must ship some of this paint of yours to foreign countries,