as going to bid good-by. I
asked him in to breakfast, but he couldn't stop; said he had promised
Grace to take breakfast with them. He has to make a farewell tour, or
old friends' feelings will be hurt. It's rather awful, and hard on
Jim, but he couldn't bear the thought of the neighbors feeling
slighted. I suggested a barbecue and a stump speech and bow, but the
idea didn't seem to appeal to Jim. Poor old fellow!"

"Couldn't he contrive to hold Shirley, Berke?" questioned Mrs. Mason,
as she passed his cup. "He had retained possession so long, there must
have been some way to hold it altogether."

"No; the thing was impossible," replied Berkeley; "the plantation was
mortgaged to the hub before Jim was born. The Byrds have been
extravagant for generations, and a crash was inevitable. Old Mr. Byrd
could barely meet the interest, even before the loss of Cousin Mary's
money. During the last years of his life some of it was added to the
principal, which made it harder work for Jim. But for Jim's
management, and the fact that the creditors all stood like a row of
blocks in which the fall of one would inevitably touch off the whole
line, things would have gone to smash long ago. Each man was afraid to
move in the matter, lest by so doing he should invite his own creditors
to come down on him. Until lately they haven't bothered Jim much
outside of wringing all the interest out of him they could get. While
his sisters were single, he was obliged to keep a home together for
them, you know. Nina's marriage last spring removed that
responsibility, and I reckon it's a relief to Jim to relinquish the
struggle."

"What a pity old Mr. Byrd persuaded Mary to sell out her bonds, and
invest the money in tobacco during the war!" observed Mrs. Mason,
regretfully. "It would have been something for the children if she had
kept the bonds. It was too bad that those great warehouses, full of
tobacco, belonging to the Byrds and Masons were burned in Richmond at
the evacuation. Charlie Mason persuaded Mr. Byrd into that
speculation, and although Charlie is my own cousin and Mary's brother,
I must admit that he did wrong. Your father always disapproved of the
sale of those bonds."

"The speculation was a good one, and would have paid splendidly had
events arranged themselves differently; even at the worst no one could
foresee the burning of Richmond. Cousin Mary's money couldn't have
freed Shirley, but if things had gone wel