ade Doctor
Prescott give anythin'?"

"He gave because he wanted to keep his promise, not because he was
forced to by that paper."

"Likely story," said Simon Basset.

"I tell you it's so."

"Likely story, Seth Prescott ever give it if he wa'n't obliged to. Ye
can't trap me."

"Go and ask him, if you don't believe me," said Jerome.

"Ye don't trap me, I'm too old."

"Go and ask Lawyer Means, then."

"I guess, when ye git me into that pesky lawyer's clutches, ye'll
know it! Ye can't trap me. I guess I know more about law than ye do,
ye damned little upstart ye! Why couldn't ye have kept your dead
man's shoes to home, darn ye? Ye'll come on the town yerself, yet; ye
won't have money enough to pay fer your buryin', an' I hope to God ye
won't! Curse ye! I'll live to see ye in your pauper's grave yet, old
's I be. Ye _thief!_ I tell ye, I 'ain't got no money. I 'ain't got
more'n five thousand dollars, countin' everythin' in the world, an'
I'll see ye all damned to hell afore I'll give ye a dollar. Let me
out, will ye?" Simon Basset made a clawing, cat-like rush through
the crowd to the door.

"I tell you, Simon Basset, you haven't got to give a dollar," shouted
Jerome; but he might as well have shouted to the wind.

"No use, J'rome," chuckled the shock-headed young man, "he's gone
plumb crazy over it. You can't make him listen to nothin'."

"What do you mean, badgering him so?" cried Jerome, angrily.

"He's a mean old cuss, anyhow," said the young man, with a defiant
laugh.

"That's so! Serves him right," grunted the others. They were all much
younger than Jerome, and many of them were mere boys. It seemed
strange that a man as sharp as Basset had taken them seriously.

Jerome, the more he thought it over, was convinced that Simon Basset
was half crazed with the fear of parting with his money. When he came
out of the store, he hesitated; he was half inclined to follow Basset
home, and try to reason him into some understanding of the truth.
Then, remembering his violent attitude towards himself, he decided
that it would be useless, and went home. He planned to plough his
garden that day.

"I've got to work at something," Jerome told himself; "if it isn't
one thing, it's got to be another." He dwelt always upon Lucina:
what she was thinking of him; if she thought that he did not love
her, because he had given her up; if she would look at him, if she
were to see him, as his sister had done the night befor