Gold Comes in Bricks Read Online Free Page A

didn’t. He went back to the weight-lifting machine and did some more work. Then he went over and weighed himself on the scales.
    He walked over to the canvas mat and said, “Do you think you could show me some of that stuff the Jap was showing you last night?”
    I met his eyes and said, “No.”
    He laughed and put on the bathrobe. After that we sat down and talked politics until it was time to take a shower and dress for breakfast.
    After breakfast Ashbury went to the office. Along about eleven o’clock I met Alta, who had just got up for breakfast. She’d evidently heard all about me. “Come on in and keep me company while I eat,” she said. “I want to talk with you.”
    It looked like a good chance to get acquainted. I went in and went through the routine of seating her at the table. I sat opposite her, and had a cup of coffee with cream and sugar while she had black coffee, three pieces of Ry-Krisp, and a cigarette. If I could have had a figure like hers by eating that sort of breakfast, I’d have done it myself. “Well?” she asked.
    I remembered what Henry Ashbury had said about being myself, and not trying to force things. “Well, what?”
    She laughed. “You’re the new physical instructor?”
    “Yes.”
    “You don’t look as though you were much of a boxer.” I didn’t say anything.
    “My stepmother tells me it’s not weight but speed. She says you’re so fast that you’re like a streak of lightning. I must see you work out some day.”
    “I’m training your father. He isn’t doing any boxing.” She eyed me critically and said, “I can see why you go in for jujitsu. That must be interesting.”
    “It is.”
    “They say you’re so good that it takes the best of the Japanese to give you any sort of a match.”
    “That’s not exactly true.”
    “But you do wrestle with the Japanese?”
    “Some.”
    “Didn’t Dad see you throwing a big Japanese wrestler last night?”
    I said, “Can’t we talk about something else besides me?”
    “What, for instance?”
    “You.”
    She shook her head. “I’m never an interesting subject of conversation at this time in the morning. Do you like to walk?”
    “No.”
    “I do. I’m going to take a long brisk walk.”
    Instructions had been most explicit. I was to get acquainted with Alta Ashbury, win her confidence, let her feel that I was capable of whipping my weight in wildcats, and get her to open up and tell me what was bothering her. In order to do that, I had to make hay while the sun was shining.
    I took a long brisk walk.
    I didn’t learn anything on the first part of the walk except that she certainly had a swell figure, that her eyes were warm and brown and had a trick of laughing every time her lips smiled. She had the endurance of a marathon runner, a love of fresh air, and a scorn for most of the conventions. After a while, we sat under some trees. I didn’t talk. She did. She hated fortune hunters and men who “had a line.” She was inclined to think marriage was the bunk, and that her father was a fool for letting himself get roped into it, that she hated her stepmother, that her stepbrother was the apple of Mrs. Ashbury’s eyes, and that she thought the apple was full of wormholes.
    I felt that was pretty good for one afternoon. I got back in time to ditch her and duck around the corner to where Bertha Cool was waiting. She took me up to the Jap. Hashita showed me a few more grips and holds, and made me do a lot more practicing. By the time I got done with him, the walk, the exercise of the day before, and the tumbles I’d taken made me feel as though I’d just lost a ten-round bout to a steam roller.
    I explained to Bertha that Ashbury was wise, so it wasn’t going to be necessary to keep up the jujitsu lessons. Bertha said she’d paid for them, and I’d take them or she’d know the reason why. I warned her about continuing to take me back and forth to the house, and told her since Ashbury was paying for it, I’d