him further
committed to their bargain by a payment down and a receipt on
account,--on condition, of course, that he sign an agreement to sell the
property when the necessary formalities could be satisfied. So he signed
with an easy flourish the simple agreement presented to him, pocketed
two hundred dollars, and bought a new suit of clothes with a black-felt
veteran's hat, the first he had had in many years. When Adelle watched
him strut down Church Street on the way to the train one hot July
morning, splendid in his new uniform with his white gloves and short
sword under his arm, she did not know that she herself had contributed
to this piece of self-indulgence her last right to a share in the Clark
possession,--her one inheritance of any value from her mother. Very
possibly she would not have said anything had she known all the facts,
had she been old enough to realize the significance of that signature
her uncle had given the lawyers a few days before. Probably she would
have accepted this act of fate as meekly as she had all else in her
short life. For it must be clearly understood that the signature was
irrevocable. No change of mind, no sober second thought coming into
John's cloudy mind, would be of any use. A contract of sale is as
binding under such circumstances as the deed itself.

Adelle felt an unconscious relief in the absence of her uncle from the
house. There was an end to the disputes about the money, and his
unpleasant person no longer occupied the best chair in the kitchen. Her
aunt also seemed to be more cheerful than was her wont. It was the slack
season in the rooming business, and so the two had some spare time on
their hands in the long summer days and could dawdle about, an unusual
luxury. They even went to walk in the afternoons. Her aunt took Adelle
to see Clark's Field,--a forlorn expanse of empty land with a fringe of
flimsy one-story shops along its edge that did not attract the child.
She never remembered, naturally, what her aunt told her about the Field,
but she must have learned something of its story because she always had
in her mind a sense of the importance of this waste and desolate city
field. In her childish way she got a vague notion of some great wrong
that had been done about the land so that her uncle was smelly and
stupid and her aunt had to take in more roomers than she liked. That was
as close to the facts as she could get then--as close, it may be said,
as many people ev