"I wonder what he will do then.Do you suppose he will try to persuade the Selectmen to buy the Lane for the town?""I don't know.I shouldn't wonder."
"It will be harder to refuse the town's offer.""Yes.Although the town can't afford to pay Colton's prices.Ibelieve that man would have raised his bid to a thousand, if I had let him.As a matter of business and nothing else, I suppose I am foolish not to push the price as high as possible and then sell.
The land is worthless to us."
"I know.But this isn't just a matter of business, is it? And we DON'T need the money.We're not rich, but we aren't poor, are we, Boy.""No.No, of course not.But, Mother, just see what I could do--for you--with a thousand dollars.Why, there are so many little things, little luxuries, that you need.""I had rather not get them that way.No, Roscoe, I wouldn't sell to Mr.Colton.And I think I wouldn't sell to the town either.""Why not?"
"Well, because we don't have to sell, and selling to either party would make ill-feeling.I should--of course I'm only a woman; you are a man and know much more about such things than I--but why not let matters stay just as they are? The townspeople can use the Lane, just as they have always done, and, as I told you before, every one has been so kind to us that I like to feel we are doing a little in return.Let them use the Lane, without cost.Why not?""What do you think the Coltons would say to that?""Perhaps they don't understand the real situation.The next time you see Mr.Colton you could explain more fully; tell him what the Lane means to the town, and so on.I'm sure he would understand, if you told him that.And then, if the sight of the wagons was too annoying, he could put up some kind of a screen, or plant a row of fir trees by the fence.Don't you think so?"I imagined the great man's reply to such a suggestion.However, Idid not express my thoughts.I told Mother not to worry, I was sure everything would be all right, and, as Dorinda called me to supper, I went into the dining-room.
Lute was waiting for me at the table, and Dorinda, after taking the tray into Mother's room, joined us.Lute was so full of excitement and curiosity that he almost forgot to eat, a miracle of itself and made greater by the fact that he did not ask a single question until his wife asked one first.Then he asked three in succession.
Dorinda, who was quite as curious as he but would not have shown it for the world, stopped him at the beginning of the fourth.
"There! there!" she said, sharply, "this is supposed to be a meal, not a parrot shop, and we're humans, not a passel of birds on a telegraph wire all hollerin' at once.Drink your tea and stop your cawin', Lute Rogers.Ros'll tell us when he gets ready.What DIDMr.Colton want of you, Roscoe?"
I told them as much of the interview at the Coltons' as I thought necessary they should know.Lute kept remarkably quiet, for him, until I named the figure offered by the millionaire.Then he could hold in no longer.
"Five hundred!" he repeated "Five hundred DOLLARS for the Shore Lane! Five--""He raised it to six hundred and fifty before I left," I said.
"SIX hundred! Six hundred--and FIFTY! For the Shore Lane! Six hun--""Sshh! shh!" cut in Dorinda."You sound like Sim Eldredge sellin'
somethin' at auction.DO be quiet! And you told him, Roscoe--?""I told you what I told him," I said.
"Um-hm.I ain't forgot it.Be quiet, Lute.Well, Roscoe, Ical'late you know your own affairs best, but, judgin' from some hints Matildy Dean hove out when she was here this afternoon, Idon't believe you've heard the last from that Shore Lane.""Matilda Dean!" I repeated."Why, Mother said Matilda wasn't here to-day.""Um-hm.Well, she was here, though Comfort didn't know it.I took pains she shouldn't.Matildy come about three o'clock, in the buggy, along with Nellie.Nellie was doin' the drivin', of course, and her mother was tellin' her how, as usual.I don't wonder that girl is such a meek, soft-spoken kind of thing.Between her pa's bullyin' and her ma's tongue, it's a wonder she's got any spirit left.It would be a mercy if George Taylor should marry her and take her out of that house.Matildy had a new book on Spiritu'lism and she was figgerin' to read some of it out loud to Comfort, but Iheaded her off.I know _I_ wouldn't want to be all stirred up about 'tests' and 'materializations' and such, and so I told her Comfort was asleep.""She wasn't asleep, neither," declared Lute."What did you tell such a whopper as that for? You're always sailin' into me if Istretch a yarn the least mite.Why, last April Fool Day you give me Hail Columby for jokin' you about a mouse under the kitchen table.Called me all kinds of names, you did--after you got down off the table."His wife regarded him scornfully."It's pretty hard to remember which IS that partic'lar day with you around," she said."I'd told Comfort she'd ought to take a nap and if she wan't takin' it 'twan't my fault.I wan't goin' to have her seein' her granddad's ghost in every corner.But, anyhow, Matildy made a little call on me, and, amongst the million other things she said, was somethin'
about Cap'n Jed hearin' that Mr.Colton was cal'latin' to shut off that Lane.Matildy hinted that her husband and the Selectmen might have a little to say afore 'twas closed.If that's so I guess you may hear from him as well as the Colton man, Roscoe.""Perhaps," I said.I could see no use in repeating my conversation with Captain Jed.
Dorinda nodded.
"Goin' to tell the town to go--where you sent the other one?" she asked, dryly.
"I don't know."
"Humph! Well," with some sarcasm, "it must be fine to be in a position where money's no object.I never tried it, myself, but it sounds good."I did not answer.
"Um-hm," she said."Well, anyhow it looks to me--Lute, you keep still--as if there was goin' to be two parties in Denboro afore this Lane business is over.One for the Coltons and one against 'em.You'll have to take one side or the other, won't you, Roscoe?""Not necessarily."
"Goin' to set on the fence, hey?"
"That's a good place TO sit, isn't it?"
