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THE CRUISE OF THE JASPER B.
CHAPTER I
A BRIGHT BLADE LEAPS FROM A RUSTY SCABBARD
ON an evening in April, 191-, Clement J. Cleggett walked sedately into the news room of the New York Enterprise with a drab-colored walking-stick in his hand. He stood the cane in a corner, changed his sober street coat for a more sober office jacket, adjusted a green eyeshade below his primly brushed grayish hair, unostentatiously sat down at the copy desk, and unobtrusively opened a drawer.
From the drawer he took a can of tobacco, a pipe, a pair of scissors, a paste-pot and brush, a pile of copy paper, a penknife and three half-lengths of lead pencil.
The can of tobacco was not remarkable. The pipe was not picturesque. The scissors were the most
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