mortgage?" he asked. "Is it anything like a
porte-cochere? I KNOW what that is, 'cause my Lady of the Roses has
one; but we haven't got that--down here."

Perry Larson sighed in exasperation.

"Gosh, if that ain't 'bout what I expected of ye! No, it ain't even
second cousin to a--a-that thing you're a-talkin' of. In plain wordin',
it's jest this: Mr. Holly, he says ter Streeter: 'You give me a
thousand dollars and I'll pay ye back on a sartin day; if I don't pay,
you can sell my farm fur what it'll bring, an' TAKE yer pay. Well, now
here 't is. Mr. Holly can't pay, an' so Streeter will put up the farm
fur sale."

"What, with Mr. and Mrs. Holly LIVING here?"

"Sure! Only they'll have ter git out, ye know."

"Where'll they go?"

"The Lord knows; I don't."

"And is THAT what they're crying for--in there?--because they've got to
go?"

"Sure!"

"But isn't there anything, anywhere, that can be done to--stop it?"

"I don't see how, kid,--not unless some one ponies up with the money
'fore next Sat'day,--an' a thousand o' them things don't grow on ev'ry
bush," he finished, gently patting the coin in his hand.

At the words a swift change came to David's face. His cheeks paled and
his eyes dilated in terror. It was as if ahead of him he saw a yawning
abyss, eager to engulf him.

"And you say--MONEY would--fix it?" he asked thickly.

"Ex-ACT-ly!--a thousand o' them, though, 't would take."

A dawning relief came into David's eyes--it was as if he saw a bridge
across the abyss.

"You mean--that there wouldn't ANYTHING do, only silver pieces--like
those?" he questioned hopefully.

"Sugar, kid, 'course there would! Gosh, but you BE a checkerboard o'
sense an' nonsense, an' no mistake! Any money would do the job--any
money! Don't ye see? Anything that's money."

"Would g-gold do it?" David's voice was very faint now.

"Sure!--gold, or silver, or greenbacks, or--or a check, if it had the
dough behind it."

David did not appear to hear the last. With an oddly strained look he
had hung upon the man's first words; but at the end of the sentence he
only murmured, "Oh, thank you," and turned away. He was walking slowly
now toward the house. His head was bowed. His step lagged.

"Now, ain't that jest like that chap," muttered the man, "ter slink off
like that as if he was a whipped cur. I'll bet two cents an' a
doughnut, too, that in five minutes he'll be what he calls 'playin' it'
on that 'ere fiddle o' his. An'