--all are eloquent of a time when
lumber was the cheapest factor of living.

The one description serves for the two farms. These men had been boys
together, their careers the same; they had married sisters. But the red
tobacco sheds of Malvern were only three hundred feet long--this general
had left a leg at Malvern Hill--while the Brookfield sheds stretched full
five hundred feet. At Brookfield, too, were the great racing-stables,
of fabulous acreage; disused now and falling to decay. One hundred and
sixty thoroughbreds had sheltered here of old, with an army of grooms
and trainers. There had been a race-track--an oval mile at first, a
kite-shaped mile in later days. Year by year now sees the stables torn
down and carted away for other uses, but the strong-built paddocks
remain to witness the greatness of days departed.

Nearest to Vesper, on the smallest of the three farms, stood the largest
of the three houses--The Meadows; better known as the Mitchell House.

McClintock, a foreigner from Philadelphia, married a Mitchell in '67. A
good family, highly connected, the Mitchells; brilliant, free-handed,
great travelers; something wildish, the younger men--boys will be boys.

In a silent, undemonstrative manner of his own McClintock gathered the
loose money in and about Vesper; a shrewd bargainer, ungiven to
merrymakings; one who knew how to keep dollars at work. It is worthy of
note that no after hint of ill dealing attached to these years. In his
own bleak way the man dealt justly; not without a prudent liberality as
well. For debtors deserving, industrious, and honest, he observed a
careful and exact kindness, passing by his dues cheerfully, to take
them at a more convenient season. Where death had been, long sickness,
unmerited misfortune--he did not stop there; advancing further sums for a
tiding-over, after careful consideration of needs and opportunities,
coupled with a reasonable expectation of repayment; cheerfully taking any
security at hand, taking the security of character as cheerfully when he
felt himself justified; in good time exacting his dues to the last
penny--still cheerfully. Not heartless, either; in cases of extreme
distress--more than once or twice--McClintock had both written off the
obligation and added to it something for the day's need, in a grim but
not unkindly fashion; always under seal of secrecy. No extortioner, this;
a dry, passionless, pertinacious man.

McClintock bought the Mitchel