Peter

"Twenty thousand?" This came timidly, fearing that it was too much, and yet hoping that it might be true.

"More!" The strain on Jack was getting dangerous.

"Twenty-five thousand?" Peter"s voice now showed that he was convinced that this sum was too small.

"More! Go on, Uncle Peter! Go on!"

"Thirty-five thousand, Jack?" It was getting hot; certainly this was the limit. Was there ever such luck?

"Yes!--and five thousand more! Forty thousand dollars and one-fifth interest in the output! Just think what Ruth will say. I"ve just sent her a telegram. Oh!--what a home-coming!"

And then, with Peter drawn up beside him, his face radiant and his eyes sparkling with joy, he poured out the story of the morning. How he had begun by telling Mr. Guthrie of his own and Mr. MacFarlane"s opinion of the property, as he did not want to sell anything he himself considered worthless. How he had told him frankly what Peter had said of his--Mr.

Guthrie"s--fairness and honesty; how he was at work for his prospective father-in-law, the distinguished engineer of whom Mr. Guthrie had no doubt heard--at which the gentleman nodded. How this property had been given him by his father, and was all he had in the world except what he could earn; how he already owed ten thousand dollars and had pledged the property as part payment, and how, in view of these facts, he would take any sum over ten thousand dollars that Mr. Guthrie would give him, provided Mr. Guthrie thought it was worth that much.

"But I am buying, not selling, your land, young man," the banker had said. "I know it, sir, and I am willing to take your own figures," Jack replied--at which Mr. Guthrie had laughed in a kindly way, and had then called in Mr. Ballantree and another man how the three had then talked in a corner, and how he had heard Mr. Guthrie say, "No, that is not fair--add another five thousand and increase the interest to one-fifth"; whereupon the two men went out and came back later with a letter in duplicate, one of which Mr. Guthrie had signed, and the other which he, Jack, signed--and here was Mr., Guthrie"s letter to prove it. With this Jack took out the doc.u.ment and laid it before Peter"s delighted eyes; adding that the deeds and Isaac"s release were to be signed in the morning, and that Mr. Guthrie had sent a special message by him to the effect that he very much wished Mr. Grayson would also be present when the final transfers would be signed and the money paid.

Whereupon the Scribe again maintains--and he is rubbing his hands with the joy of it all as he does it--that there was more sunshine than clouds in this particular Unexpected, and that if all the boys in the world were as frank and sincere as young Jack Breen, and all the grown-ups as honest as old Robert Guthrie, the REAL banker, the jails would be empty and the millennium knocking at our doors.

Peter had drunk in every word of the story, bowing his head, fanning out his fingers, or interrupting with his customary "Well, well!" whenever some particular detail seemed to tend toward the final success.

And then, the story over, there came the part that Peter never forgot; that he has told me a dozen times, and always with the same trembling tear under the eyelids, and the same quivering of his lower lip.

Jack had drawn his chair nearer the old gentleman, and had thrown one arm over the shoulder of his dearest friend in the world. There was a moment"s silence as they sat there, and then Jack began. "There is something I want you to do for me, Uncle Peter," he said, drawing his arm closer till his own fresh cheek almost touched the head of the older man. "Please, don"t refuse."

"Refuse, my dear boy! I am too happy to-day to refuse anything. Come, out with it."

"I am going to give you half of this money. I love you better than any one in this world except Ruth, and I want you to have it."

Peter threw up his hands and sprang to his feet.

"What!--You want to--Why, Jack! Are you crazy! Me! My dear boy, it"s very lovely of you to wish to do it, but just think. Oh, you dear Jack! No!--no, no!" He was beating the air now deprecatingly with his outspread fingers as he strode around the room, laughing short laughs in his effort to keep back the tears.

Jack followed him in his circuit, talking all the while, until he had penned the old gentleman in a corner between the open desk and the window.

"But, Uncle Peter--think what you have done for me! Do you suppose for one moment that I don"t know that it was you and not I who sold the property? Do you think Mr. Guthrie would have added that five thousand dollars to the price if he hadn"t wanted to help you as well as me?"

"Five thousand dollars, my dear Jack, is no more to Robert Guthrie than a ferry ticket is to you or me. He gave you the full price because you trusted to his honesty and told him the truth, and he saw your inexperience."

"No--it was YOU he was thinking of, I tell you," protested Jack, with eager emphasis. "He would never have sent Ballantree for me had you not talked to him--and it has been so with everything since I knew you. You have been father, friend, everybody to me. You gave me Ruth and my work.

Everything I am I owe to you. You must--you SHALL have half of this money! Ruth and I can be married, and that is all we want, and what is left I can put into our new work to help Mr. MacFarlane. Please, Uncle Peter!--we will both be so much happier if we know you share it with us." Here his voice rose and a strain of determination rang through it.

"And, by George!--Uncle Peter, the more I think of it, the more I am convinced that it is fair. It"s yours--not mine. I WILL have it that way--you are getting old, and you need it."

Peter broke into a laugh. It was the only way he could keep down the tears.

"What a dear boy you are, Jack," he said, backing toward the sofa and regaining his seat. "You"ve got a heart as big as a house, and I"m proud of you, but no--not a penny of your money. Think a moment! Your father didn"t leave the property to me--not any part of it--he left it to you, you spendthrift! When I get too old to work I am going up to Felicia"s and pick out an easy-chair and sit in a corner and dry up gradually and be laid away in lavender. No, my lad, not a penny! Gift money should go to cripples and hypochondriacs, not to spry old gentlemen. I would not take it from my own father"s estate when I was your age, and I certainly won"t take it now from you. I made Felicia take it all." Jack opened his eyes. He had often wondered why Peter had so little and she so much.

"Oh, yes, nearly forty years ago! But I have never regretted it since!

And you must see how just it was, for there wasn"t enough for two, and Felicia was a woman. No--be very careful of gift money, my boy, and be very careful, also, of too much of anybody"s money--even your own. What makes me most glad in this whole affair is that Guthrie didn"t give you a million--that might have spoilt you. This is just enough. You and Ruth can start square. You can help Henry--and you ought to, he has been mighty good to you. And, best of all, you can keep at work. Yes--that"s the best part of it--that you can keep at work. Go right on as you are; work every single day of your life, and earn your bread as you have done ever since you left New York, and, one thing more, and don"t you ever forget it: Be sure you take your proper share of fun and rest as you go. Eight hours" work, eight hours" play, eight hours" sleep--that"s the golden rule and the only one to live by. Money will never get its grip on you if you keep this up. This fortune hasn"t yet tightened its fingers around your throat, or you would never have come up here to give me half of it--and never let it! Money is your servant, my boy, not your master. And now go home and kiss Ruth for me, and tell her that I love her dearly. Wait a moment. I will go with you as far as Isaac"s. I am going to tell him the good news. Then I"ll have him measure me for a coat to dance at your wedding."

And the Unexpecteds are not yet over. There was still another, of quite a different character, about to fall--and out of another clear sky, too--a sort of April-shower sky, where you get wet on one side of the street and keep dry on the other. Jack had the dry side this time, and went on his way rejoicing, but the head of the house of Breen caught the downpour, and a very wet downpour it was.

It all occurred when Jack was hurrying to the ferry and when he ran into the senior member of the firm, who was hurrying in the opposite direction.

"Ah, Jack!--the very man I wanted to see," cried Breen. "I was going to write you. There"s something doing up in that ore country. Better drop in to-morrow, I may be able to handle it for you, after all."

"I am sorry, sir, but it"s not for sale," said Jack, trying to smother his glee.

"Why?" demanded Breen bluntly.

"I have sold it to Mr. Robert Guthrie."

"Guthrie! The devil you say!--When?"

"To-day. The final papers are signed to-morrow. Excuse me, I must catch my boat--" and away he went, his cup now br.i.m.m.i.n.g over, leaving Breen biting his lips and muttering to himself as he gazed after him.

"Guthrie!--My customer! d.a.m.n that boy--I might have known he would land on his feet."

But Jack kept on home to his sweetheart, most of the way in the air.

Down in the little room all this time in the rear of the tailor"s shop the two old men sat talking. Peter kept nothing back; his lips quivering again and another unbidden tear peeping over the edge of his eyelid when he told of Jack"s offer.

"A dear boy, Isaac--yes, a dear boy. He never thinks with his head--only with his heart. Never has since I knew him. Impulsive, emotional, unpractical, no doubt--and yet somehow he always wins. Queer--very queer! He comes upstairs to me and I start out on a fool"s errand. He goes down to you, and you hand him out your money. He gives it all away the next day, and then we have Guthrie doubling the price. Queer, I tell you, Isaac--extraordinary, that"s what it is--almost uncanny."

The Jew threw away his cigar, rested his short elbows on the arms of his chair, and made a basket of his hands, the tips of all his fingers touching.

"No, you are wrong, my good friend. It is not extraordinary and it is not uncanny. It is very simple--exceedingly simple. n.o.body runs over a child if he can help it. Even a thief will bring you back your pocket-book if you trust him to take care of it. It is the trusting that does it. Few men, no matter how crooked, can resist the temptation of reaching, if only for a moment, an honest man"s level."

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

Peter"s coat was finished in time for the wedding--trust Isaac for that--and so was his double-breasted white waistcoat--he had not changed the cut in twenty years; and so were his pepper-and-salt trousers and all his several appointments, little and big, even to his polka-dot scarf of blue silk, patent-leather shoes and white gaiters. Quite the best-dressed man in the room, everybody said, and they of all the people in the world should have known.

And the wedding!

And all that went before it, and all that took place on that joyous day; and all that came after that happiest of events!

Ruth and Jack, with Peter"s covert endors.e.m.e.nt, had wanted to slip into the village church some afternoon at dusk, with daddy and Peter and Miss Felicia, and one or two more, and then to slip out again and disappear.

MacFarlane had been in favor of the old Maryland home, with Ruth"s grandmother in charge, and the neighbors driving up in mud-encrusted buggies and lumbering coaches, their inmates warmed by roaring fires and roaring welcomes--fat turkeys, hot waffles, egg-nogg, apple-toddy, and the rest of it. The head of the house of Breen expressed the opinion (this on the day Jack gave his check for the bonds prior to returning them to Isaac, who wouldn"t take a cent of interest) that the ceremony should by all means take place in Grace Church, after which everybody would adjourn to his house on the Avenue, where the wedding-breakfast would be served, he being nearest of kin to the groom, and the bride being temporarily without a home of her own--a proposition which, it is needless to say, Jack declined on the spot, but in terms so courteous and with so grand and distinguished an air that the head of the house of Breen found his wonder increasing at the change that had come over the boy since he shook the dust of the Breen home and office from his feet.

The Grande Dame of Geneseo did not agree with any of these makeshifts.

There would be no Corklesville wedding if she could help it, with gaping loungers at the church door; nor would there be any Maryland wedding with a ten-mile ride over rough roads to a draughty country-house, where your back would freeze while your cheeks burned up; nor yet again any city wedding, with an awning over the sidewalk, a red carpet and squad of police, with Tom, d.i.c.k, and Harry inside the church, and Harry, d.i.c.k and Tom squeezed into an oak-panelled dining-room at high noon with every gas-jet blazing.

And she did not waste many seconds coming to this conclusion. Off went a telegram, after hearing the various propositions, followed by a letter, that might have melted the wires and set fire to the mail-sack, so fervid were the contents.

"Nonsense! My dear Ruth, you will be married in my house and the breakfast will be in the garden. If Peter and your father haven"t got any common sense, that"s no reason why you and Jack should lose your wits."