David Harum

farm titles, ’cept by inher’tance or foreclosure, in thirty years. So Billy P. didn’t make no effort. Int’rist’s one o’ them things that keeps right on nights an’ Sundays. He jest had the deeds made out and handed ’em over when the time came to settle. The’ was some village lots though that was clear, that fetched him in some money from time to time until they was all gone but one, an’ that’s the one Mis’ Cullom lives on now. It was consid’able more’n a lot⁠—in fact, a putty sizable place. She thought the sun rose an’ set where Billy P. was, but she took a crotchit in her head, and wouldn’t ever sign no papers fer that, an’ lucky fer him too. The’ was a house on to it, an’ he had a roof over his head anyway when he died six or seven years after he married, an’ left her with a boy to raise. How she got along all them years till Charley got big enough to help, I swan! I don’t know. She took in sewin’ an’ washin’, an’ went out to cook an’ nurse, an’ all that, but I reckon the’ was now an’ then times when they didn’t overload their stomechs much, nor have to open the winders to cool off. But she held onto that prop’ty of her’n like a pup to a root. It was putty well out when Billy P. died, but the village has growed up to it. The’s some good lots could be cut out on’t, an’ it backs up to the river where the current’s enough to make a mighty good power fer a ’lectric light. I know some fellers that are talkin’ of startin’ a plant here, an’ it ain’t out o’ sight that they’d pay a good price fer the river front, an’ enough land to build on. Fact on’t is, it’s got to be a putty valu’ble piece o’ prop’ty, more ’n she cal’lates on, I reckon.”

Here Mr. Harum paused, pinching his chin with thumb and index finger, and mumbling his tobacco. John, who had listened with more attention than interest⁠—wondering the while as to what the narrative was leading up to⁠—thought something might properly be expected of him to show that he had followed it, and said, “So Mrs. Cullom has kept this last piece clear, has she?”

“No,” said David, bringing down his right hand upon the desk with emphasis, “that’s jest what she hain’t done, an’ that’s how I come to tell ye somethin’ of the story, an’ more on’t ’n you’ve cared about hearin’, mebbe.”

“Not at all,” John protested. “I have been very much interested.”

“You have, have you?” said Mr. Harum. “Wa’al, I got somethin’ I want ye to do. Day after to-morro’ ’s Chris’mus, an’ I want ye to drop Mis’ Cullom a line, somethin’ like this, ‘That Mr. Harum told ye to say that that morgidge he holds, havin’ ben past due fer some time, an’ no int’rist havin’ ben paid fer, let me see, more’n a year, he wants to close the matter up, an’ he’ll see her Chris’mus mornin’ at the bank at nine o’clock, he havin’ more time on that day; but that, as fur as he can see, the bus’nis won’t take very long’⁠—somethin’ like that, you understand?”

“Very well, sir,” said John, hoping that his employer would not see in his face the disgust and repugnance he felt as he surmised what a scheme was on foot, and recalled what he had heard of Harum’s hard and unscrupulous ways, though he had to admit that this, excepting perhaps the episode of the counterfeit money, was the first revelation to him personally. But this seemed very bad to him.

“All right,” said David cheerfully, “I s’pose it won’t take you long to find out what’s in your stockin’, an’ if you hain’t nothin’ else to do Chris’mus mornin’ I’d like to have you open the office and stay ’round a spell till I git through with Mis’ Cullom. Mebbe the’ ’ll be some papers to fill out or witniss or somethin’; an’ have that skeezicks of a boy make up the fires so’st the place’ll be warm.”

“Very good, sir,” said John, hoping that the interview was at an end.

But the elder man sat for some minutes apparently in a brown study, and occasionally a smile of sardonic cunning wrinkled his face. At last he said: “I’ve told ye so much that I may as well tell ye how I come by that morgidge. ’Twont take but a minute, an’ then you can run an’ play,” he added with a chuckle.

“I trust I have not betrayed any impatience,” said John, and instantly conscious of his infelicitous expression, added hastily, “I have really been very much interested.”

“Oh, no,” was the reply, “you hain’t betrayed none, but I know old fellers like me gen’rally tell a thing twice over while they’re at it. Wa’al,” he went on, “it was like this. After Charley Cullom got to be some grown he helped to keep the pot a-bilin’, ’n they got on some better. ’Bout seven year ago, though, he up an’ got married, an’ then the fat ketched fire. Finally he allowed that if he had some money he’d go West ’n take up some land, ’n git along like pussly ’n a flower gard’n. He ambitioned that if his mother ’d raise a thousan’ dollars on her place he’d be sure to take care of the int’rist, an’ prob’ly pay off the princ’ple in almost no time. Wa’al, she done it, an’ off he went. She didn’t come to me fer the money, because⁠—I dunno⁠—at any rate she didn’t, but got it of ’Zeke Swinney.

“Wa’al, it turned out jest ’s any fool might ’ve predilictid, fer after the first year, when I reckon he paid it out of the thousan’, Charley never paid no int’rist. The second year he was jest gettin’ goin’, an’ the next year