arum had been
equally oblivious, promised himself to repair the omission later on. He
would have preferred to go out and leave the two to settle their affair
without witness or hearer, but his employer, who, as he had found,
usually had a reason for his actions, had explicitly requested him to
remain, and he had no choice. He perched himself upon one of the office
stools and composed himself to await the conclusion of the affair.

CHAPTER XIX.

Mrs. Cullom was sitting at one corner of the fire, and David drew a
chair opposite to her.

"Feelin' all right now? whisky hain't made ye liable to no disorderly
conduct, has it?" he asked with a laugh.

"Yes, thank you," was the reply, "the warm things are real comfortin',
'n' I guess I hain't had licker enough to make me want to throw things.
You got a kind streak in ye, Dave Harum, if you did send me this here
note--but I s'pose ye know your own bus'nis," she added with a sigh of
resignation. "I ben fearin' fer a good while 't I couldn't hold on t'
that prop'ty, an' I don't know but what you might's well git it as 'Zeke
Swinney, though I ben hopin' 'gainst hope that Charley 'd be able to do
more 'n he has."

"Let's see the note," said David curtly. "H'm, humph, 'regret to say
that I have been instructed by Mr. Harum'--wa'al, h'm'm, cal'lated to
clear his own skirts anyway--h'm'm--'must be closed up without further
delay' (John's eye caught the little white stocking which still lay on
his desk)--wa'al, yes, that's about what I told Mr. Lenox to say fur's
the bus'nis part's concerned--I might 'a' done my own regrettin' if I'd
wrote the note myself." (John said something to himself.) "'T ain't the
pleasantest thing in the world fer ye, I allow, but then you see,
bus'nis is bus'nis."

John heard David clear his throat, and there was a hiss in the open
fire. Mrs. Cullom was silent, and David resumed:

"You see, Mis' Cullom, it's like this. I ben thinkin' of this matter fer
a good while. That place ain't ben no real good to ye sence the first
year you signed that morgidge. You hain't scurcely more'n made ends
meet, let alone the int'rist, an' it's ben simply a question o' time,
an' who'd git the prop'ty in the long run fer some years. I reckoned,
same as you did, that Charley 'd mebbe come to the front--but he hain't
done it, an' 't ain't likely he ever will. Charley's a likely 'nough boy
some ways, but he hain't got much 'git there' in his make-up, not more'n
enoug