Alger Horatio Jr.
Herbert Carter's Legacy; Or, the Inventor's Son
CHAPTER X
SQUIRE LEECH IS BAFFLED
Tuesday arrived, but as yet the check from Mr. Spencer had not been received.
“Never mind, mother,” said Herbert, “you will get it before the end of the week.”
“But I shall need it to pay the interest to Squire Leech. He will call for it today.”
“How much it is?”
“Twenty-two dollars and a half.”
“You forget the gold I handed you last week.”
“I don’t like to use it, Herbert; I want you to use it for yourself.”
“I am as much interested in paying the interest as you, mother. Don’t I occupy the house?”
Seeing that Herbert was in earnest, Mrs. Carter overcame her scruples, and laid aside enough of the money to make up the amount required.
About five minutes of twelve Squire Leech was seen advancing to the front door with slow, pompous steps.
“There he comes, mother!” said Herbert. “I’ll open the door.”
“Is your mother at home, Herbert?” asked the squire, in a dignified tone.
“Yes, sir. Won’t you walk in?”
“Ahem, yes! I think I will. I have a little matter of business with her.”
Squire Leech entered the small sitting room, which seemed uncomfortably full when he was in it—not on account of his size, but because he seemed so swollen with a sense of his own importance as to convey the idea that he was cramped for space—very much like an owl in the cage of a canary.
“Good morning, Squire Leech,” said the widow.
“Good morning, ma’am. I apprehend you know my errand.”
“I suppose you come for the interest, Squire Leech.”
“You are quite right. Of course you are prepared to pay it.”
Though the squire said “of course,” he by no means expected that it would be ready, nor, for reasons which we know, did he desire it. He was rather discomfited, therefore, when Mrs. Carter said: “Did you bring a receipt with you, squire?”
“A receipt in full?” queried the great man.
“Yes, sir.”
“Are you prepared to pay the whole today?”
“Yes, sir.”
This ought to have been gratifying intelligence, but it was not. The squire looked quite crestfallen.
“No, I didn’t bring a receipt,” he said, slowly.
“I’ll bring writing materials,” said Herbert, promptly.
He left the room, but appeared almost instantly with pen, ink, and paper.
The squire sat down to the table with a disappointed air, and slowly wrote the required document.
“He seems sorry to receive the money,” thought Herbert, who was quick in reading the faces of others. “I wonder why?” and he gazed at the visitor in some perplexity.
The squire received the money, and handed the widow the receipt. Still he did not seem inclined to go. He was thinking how to broach the subject of selling the house.
“Mrs. Carter,” he began, “forty-five dollars a year seems a good deal for you to pay.”
“Yes, it is considerable,” said the widow, surprised. Could it be that he intended to reduce the interest? That did not seem like him.
“For one in your circumstances I mean, of course. You’ve got to earn your own living, and your son’s.”
“Herbert does his share,” said the mother. “When he is older I shall feel quite easy.”
“But that time is a good way off. I’ve been thinking of your case, Mrs. Carter, and as a man of business I see my way clear to offer you a little advice.”
“I shall be thankful for any advice, squire,” said the widow, meekly. “Of course your judgment in business matters is much better than mine.”
Herbert listened to this conversation with eager interest. What could the squire mean to advise?
“I’ve been thinking,” said the squire, deliberately, “that it would be a good plan for you to sell this house.”
“To sell it!” repeated Mrs. Carter, in surprise. “But where could I live?”
“You might hire a couple of rooms for yourself and Herbert.”
“I don’t see how mother would gain anything,” interrupted Herbert. “She would have to pay rent.”
“Very true, but she would get some money down for the house, over and above the mortgage.”
“I don’t know as anybody would want to buy it,” said Mrs. Carter.
“I would take it off your hands, simply to oblige you,” said the squire, with an air of extraordinary consideration. “I don’t know that it would be of any particular use to me. I might not get a tenant. Still, I am better able to take the risk than you are to keep it.”
“How much would you be willing to pay for it?” asked Herbert, who somehow suspected that the squire was more selfish than benevolent in the plan he had broached.
“Why,” said Squire Leech, assuming a meditative look, “over and above the mortgage, I would be willing to pay three hundred dollars cash.”
“That would make the value of the place only ten hundred and fifty dollars,” said Herbert.
“Well, you don’t consider it worth any more than that do you?”
“My husband considered it worth fifteen hundred dollars,” said the widow. “It cost him that.”
The squire laughed heartily. “Really, my dear madam, that is utterly preposterous. Fifteen hundred dollars! Why, that is ridiculous.”
“It cost that,” said Herbert, sturdily.
“I very much doubt it,” said the squire. “I don’t believe it cost a cent over twelve hundred dollars.”
“I have my husband’s papers to show that it cost fifteen hundred,” said the widow.
“Then all I have to say is, he was outrageously cheated,” said the squire. “I believe I know as much about real estate as any man in town,” he proceeded, pompously. “Indeed, I own more than any other man. I assure you, on my word, I have offered you a very good price.”
“I would rather not sell,” said the widow, gently, but decidedly.
“I will increase my offer to eleven hundred, including the mortgage,” said the squire, who saw the prize slipping through his fingers, and felt it necessary to bid higher. “Eleven hundred dollars. That’s three hundred and fifty dollars cash!”
“Mother, I am sure you won’t think of selling for any such sum,” expostulated Herbert.
“No,” said his mother, “I don’t want to sell.”
“You stand very much in your own light, ma’am,” said the squire, impatiently; “and you, Herbert, are too young to offer any advice on such a subject.”
“I don’t see why,” said Herbert, independently. “I ought to feel interested in such a matter.
“You are a boy, and have no judgment. Boys of your age should be seen and not heard,” said the squire, sternly.
“I can see what is best for my mother’s interest,” said Herbert.
“I decline to discuss the matter with you. I consider your interference impertinent,” said the squire, becoming angry.
“Oh, Herbert!” said his mother, who was a little in awe of the great man of the village, “be respectful to Squire Leech.”
“I mean to be,” said Herbert, “but I’m sure he’s wrong in thinking I have nothing to do with this matter.”
“Reflect again, Mrs. Carter,” persisted the squire, “of the advantages of my proposal. Think how comfortable you would feel in knowing that you had three hundred and fifty dollars on interest in the savings bank. I admit that I may not offer you quite as much as the place cost, but houses never fetch their first cost. I’ve made you a very fair offer, ma’am, very fair.”
“I won’t say anything as to that, Squire Leech, but this house my poor husband built—in this house I have passed many happy years—and while we can keep it, Herbert and I, we will. There is no other place in town that would seem so much like home.”
“This is all very sentimental, ma’am; but, permit me to say, very ridiculous,” said the impatient squire, rising to go. “I’ll give you time to think over what I have said, and I’ll call again.”
“I’ll have that place yet,” he muttered to himself, as he left the cottage. “I won’t be balked by an obstinate woman and an impertinent boy.”
CHAPTER XI
SICKNESS
Squire Leech was reluctant to give up his intended purchase. He had an idea that Herbert stood in the way, and he contrived to call upon the widow in the course of the following week, at a time when he knew our hero was away from home.
But he failed again.
“I’m very sorry to go contrary to your advice, Squire Leech,” said Mrs. Carter, deprecatingly, “but I can’t give up my home. Herbert, too, would be very much disappointed.”
“I hope you will not allow yourself to be guided by the judgment of an inexperienced boy, ma’am,” said the squire, mortified.
“I think I ought to consult my boy’s wishes,” said the widow.
“He doesn’t know what is best for him.”
“Perhaps not; but I feel with him at present. I’m sorry to disappoint you, Squire Leech.”
“As to that, ma’am, I have no interest in the matter. I was only advising you for your good.”
“I’m sure I’m much obliged to you.”
“In fact, as your means are limited, I will stretch a point, and offer you fifty dollars more. I shouldn’t be at all sure of getting my money back.”
“Thank you; but I think we’ll keep the house for the present. If I should find we couldn’t afford it, I will let you know.”
“I don’t agree to keep to my offer after this week. ‘Now or never’ is my motto. I can draw the papers right out.”
The widow shook her head, and reiterated in gentle tones her refusal. Squire Leech was provoked, and did not hide his feeling. As he only proposed to take the house to oblige her, as he represented, Mrs. Carter was surprised at his display of feeling. She was not a shrewd woman, and it did not occur to her that he had any selfish object in view in his advice.
“I didn’t succeed, Mr. Banks,” said the squire to his superintendent. “That Carter woman is dreadfully obstinate. Between ourselves, I judge it’s her son that influences her.”
“I think I have seen him—a boy of fourteen or fifteen.”
“Yes, he’s a very self-willed boy.”
“You said you thought you would be able to foreclose, on account of their failing to pay the interest.”
“They paid it. I was surprised at their promptness, till I learned from my son that they had received a legacy of a hundred dollars or so from a relative.”
“That won’t last always.”
“No, the time will come when I can get the place on my own terms. I am determined to have it.”
“Then Brown will have to find a different house.”
“Yes; I have heard of an old house that will do temporarily, till I get the widow Carter’s. It’s a little out of the village, and is in rather a dilapidated condition, but it will do for a few months or a year, and that will fetch round the Carters.”
The house referred to was secured, and the superintendent’s cousin moved to Wrayburn. But neither the squire nor Mr. Banks forgave Herbert for his assumed instrumentality in thwarting their plans.
The next winter Mrs. Carter was unfortunate enough to be laid up with severe sickness from December to March. Herbert devoted himself to her comfort, and performed nearly all his mother’s customary work. Washing and ironing, however, he was obliged to have done. When the sickness commenced, the hundred dollars left by his uncle was unbroken, but for three months neither he nor, of course, his mother, was able to earn anything of any amount, while their expenses were necessarily increased.
At the opening of April, Herbert had the satisfaction of seeing his mother, fully recovered, assume her usual place in the little household. This was pleasant, but there was a drawback to his satisfaction. The legacy had dwindled to twenty-five dollars.
He reported this to his mother.
“How unlucky that I should have been sick so long!” said Mrs. Carter, sighing.
“How lucky we had the legacy to fall back upon!” said Herbert.
“I don’t know how we could have got along without that, truly.”
“Mother, I must look about for work. I ought to be earning four or five dollars a week at my age.”
“You are only fifteen.”
“But I am stout and strong of my age. I shall soon be a man. Don’t you see my mustache coming, mother?” said Herbert, with a laugh.
“Not very distinctly; but perhaps my eyesight is growing poor,” answered his mother, smiling.
“The trouble is,” said Herbert, thoughtfully, “there is very little chance of work in this town.”
“I wonder whether Squire Leech wouldn’t hire you through the spring and summer on one of his farms. I heard that he is going to hire a boy.”
“I am not sure whether he would be willing to hire me, however much he wanted a boy.”
“Why not?”
“He don’t seem to like me, nor does Mr. Banks like me.”
“What can they have against you? I thought everybody liked you.”
“That’s because you are my mother, but the squire doesn’t feel maternal so far as I am concerned. I didn’t understand it at first, but now I do.”
“What is it?”
“You remember the squire tried hard to get you to sell this place.”
“That was last year.”
“And you wouldn’t sell. That is why he is angry with both of us.”
“But I don’t understand why he should be,” said the widow, innocently. “He said he would take it only as a favor to me.”
“That was all ‘gammon.’ Excuse the word, which isn’t very elegant, I admit, but it’s the right word for all that. The squire wanted the place very much.”
“What could he do with it? He couldn’t live in it himself.”
“Not much. I can imagine the look of disgust James’s face would wear at the idea of such a thing. He wanted it for Nahum Brown, who lives in the old house up the road. You know Brown, who is a cousin of Mr. Banks, the superintendent, and he is very anxious to get hold of our house.”
“How did you learn all this, Herbert? I never knew it before.”
“Tom Banks let it out one day.”
“I don’t see how the squire can dislike us for wanting to stay in our old home.”
“There are a good many things you don’t understand—about selfish men—mother. That is why I am afraid it won’t be much use to ask the squire for employment.”
“You may be mistaken about his feelings, Herbert.”
“At any rate, I’ll go to him, if I can’t find employment anywhere else in the village.”
“I wish you would, that is, if you don’t think farm work will be too hard for you.”
“I’ll risk that.”
In pursuance of this promise, Herbert, after ascertaining that there was no work to be had anywhere else in the village, called one fine morning at the imposing residence of Squire Leech.
James was in the yard, at work on a kite.
“Have you come to see me?” said James, superciliously.
“No; I wanted to see your father.”
“What about?”
Herbert was about to answer “on business,” but it occurred to him that it would be better policy to keep on friendly terms with James, and he said: “I am looking for work, and I thought he might have some for me.”
“Perhaps so,” said James, patronizingly. “Of course, one in your position must work for a living.”
“Don’t you expect to work?” asked Herbert, in some curiosity.
“Not with my hands, of course,” said James. “I may study some genteel profession, such as law.”
“I am too poor to be genteel,” said Herbert, amused.
“Of course. You will probably be a day laborer.”
“I hope to rise to something better in time,” said Herbert. “For the present I shall be glad to work by the day, or the month, if your father will engage me.”
“I think my father is at home; you can ring and see,” said James, who could be kind to one who was willing to acknowledge his inferiority.
Herbert rang the bell, and was ushered into the presence of Squire Leech, who was examining some papers in the back parlor.
CHAPTER XII
POOR AND PROUD
“Good morning, Squire Leech,” said Herbert, politely.
“Good morning,” said the squire, jumping to the conclusion that the Carters had made up their minds to sell their place. “Do you wish to see me?”
“Yes, sir; I hope I don’t interrupt you.”
“Go on,” said the squire, waving his hand. “I am busy, to be sure, but I can give you a few minutes.”
He resolved to take advantage of Mrs. Carter’s necessities, and make a smaller offer for the place. In this way he would make her suffer for her former obstinate refusal to entertain his proposition.
His face fell when Herbert said: “I came to ask you if you could give me employment on one of your farms. My mother has been sick, and I feel that I ought to be doing something to earn money.”
“Ahem!” said the squire, “I leave all such matters to Mr. Banks. Was that all you wished to say to me?”
“I believe so,” said Herbert. “Will there be any use in applying to Mr. Banks?”
“I don’t know whether he has got help enough or not. Your mother has been sick, hasn’t she?”
“Yes, sir; all winter.”
“I heard of it. I suppose you found it expensive, eh?”
“Yes, sir. Neither of us could earn anything.”
“You are in debt, then?”
“No, sir. My uncle left us some money last year. That kept us along.”
“It’s pretty much used up now, I suppose?”
“Not quite.”
Herbert was inclined to be surprised at the squire’s apparent interest in their affairs, but the motive soon became apparent.
“Well, you have made up your mind to sell the house now, I suppose?” said the squire.
“No, we hadn’t thought of it.”
“But you’ll have to.”
“Not if I can get employment,” said Herbert. “Our expenses are very small, and we can live on a little.”
The great man frowned. “That is all nonsense,” he said, impatiently. “It is quite impossible for you to hold on to the house. I am willing to give you cash down three hundred dollars over and above the mortgage for it.”
“That isn’t as much as you offered last year,” said Herbert, shrewdly.
“I believe I did offer three hundred and fifty then.”
“Your last offer was fifty dollars more than that.”
“It may be so, but I told your mother that it wasn’t a standing offer. She must accept it then or not at all.”
“We don’t ask you to purchase,” said Herbert, independently. “I had no idea of such a thing when I came here.”
“That makes no difference. You will have to sell, of course, and I have made up my mind to offer you three hundred and fifty. If you had taken me up at the time, I would have given you fifty more. You can’t expect that now, however.”
“We don’t expect anything. The house is not for sale.”
“Then, why are you taking up my valuable time?” demanded the squire, frowning with displeasure.
“I beg your pardon, sir. I only came in to ask for employment.”
“That I might have given you, if you hadn’t been so unreasonable.”
“I don’t think we are unreasonable, Squire Leech. Even if we were willing to sell, we should ask, at least, fourteen hundred dollars for the place.”
“Fourteen hundred! Are you crazy? I never heard of such a thing.”
“The place, land and all, cost my father fifteen hundred.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“We’ve got his papers to show that it is so.”
“It isn’t worth near that now.”
“It is certainly worth more than eleven hundred, which is all you offer.”
“Look here, Carter,” said the squire, “I don’t mind telling you that I want the place for one of my men—Brown. That is my only object in making you an offer at all. He is the cousin of Mr. Banks, my superintendent, and I rather think Banks will find you something to do, if you will induce your mother to sell the place.”
“I can’t do that,” said Herbert, slowly. “I can’t consent to my mother making such a sacrifice. She might as well give you three or four hundred dollars as sell the place so much under price.”
“You are a boy, and know nothing about business. You think property must necessarily bring its first cost, though, mind you, I don’t admit that yours cost anything like fifteen hundred dollars.”
“I am inexperienced,” Herbert admitted, “but I am sure it would be foolish to sell for eleven hundred dollars.”
“You may have to sell for less.”
“How is that?”
“If you are not prepared with the interest when the time comes, I shall foreclose.”
“You wouldn’t be so hard on us as that, Squire Leech,” said Herbert, anxiously.
“I don’t call it hard, it is only just and legal. When that time comes, I don’t promise to pay as much as I offer to-day.”
Herbert looked serious. He saw that the squire meant just what he said; that, in fact, he was lying in wait their need should put them in his power.
“Well,” said the squire, triumphantly, “you see how the matter stands now?”
“I do,” said Herbert.
“Then you will cease your foolish opposition to what is best for you.” “I will speak to my mother about it,” said Herbert, rising. “The place is hers, not mine, and she must decide.”
“Without your offering any foolish advice, I hope.”
“I can’t say as to that, Squire Leech. I will bid you good morning.”
“Good morning. If you change your mind, call again, and we will see about the employment.”
“Well,” said James, as Herbert came out, “did you get work?”
“Not yet; your father is not sure whether he will find any for me.”
“When I am a man,” said James, pompously, “I do say I may be able to throw something in your way.”
“Thank you,” said Herbert, tempted to smile in spite of his serious thoughts.
“I shall be richer than my father,” added James, “his property is increasing every year.”
“You have an excellent prospect before you,” said Herbert, half enviously.
“That’s so. Wouldn’t you like to change places with me?”
“I am not sure about that.”
“You are not sure about that?” repeated James, incredulously.
“No.”
“Why, I am a rich man’s son.”
“I know that; but I have an excellent mother.”
“She has got no money.”
“I should not value her more if she were worth a million,” said Herbert, warmly.
“Of course,” said James; “but that won’t save you from being a day laborer.”
“It is my great ambition just at present to become a day laborer,” said Herbert, smiling.
“Of course, there’s a great difference between us. But I say, Carter, can you help me with this kite? There’s something wrong about it. It won’t fly.”
Herbert looked at it critically.
“The trouble is with the frame,” he said. “It’s too heavy.”
“I wish you’d help me about it.”
Very good-naturedly our hero set to work, and in the course of twenty minutes or so the difficulty was obviated. The kite would fly.
“You may stay and help me fly it,” said James, condescendingly.
“Thank you; I shall be needed at home.”
“Oh, I forgot. Your time is valuable. Here, take this.”
James, with extraordinary liberality, held out five cents to Herbert.
“What is that for?” asked Herbert, puzzled, and not offering to take the money.
“For your help about the kite.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t think of charging anything for that,” said Herbert, amused.
“Why not? You are poor, and I am rich.”
“I know it, but I don’t want money for a trifle like that.”
“Just as you say,” said James, returning the money to his pocket, a little relieved, if the truth must be told, that the coin was not accepted, for he was naturally fond of money.
“Good morning,” said Herbert, turning to go. “If the kite gets out of order, you can call upon me any time.”
“I wonder why he didn’t take the money,” thought James. “He may be poor and proud; I’ve heard of such cases; but of course it would be absurd for a boy in his position to be proud.”
Herbert kept on his way with a very serious face. It seemed as if they must lose their home, after all.
