Puslapio vaizdai
PDF
„ePub“

eyes. "I could tell you things about bad. I never did see such a funny Uncle Jed that 'u'd surprise you."

Mrs. McAusland called from the kitchen to warn me that if I did n't look out I'd get Chet started; but I reassured her, and bade Chet tell on. That which follows is the substance of his telling.

§ 2

This Jedidiah Grant, so Chet assured me, was by all odds the meanest man that ever dwelt in Fraternity, where to be mean and to be miserly are synonymous.

"Why," said Chet, "he was so mean he would n't let you see him laugh; fear it 'u'd tickle you." And he began to chuckle at some recollection, so that it was necessary to spur him before he would go on.

"I was thinking," he explained, "of the time Jed went down to Boston. Went to turn some gold into greenbacks. This was after the war, when the greenbacks was 'way down. Jed had made some money boot-legging in Bangor, and he see a chance to make some more. Trip did n't cost him a thing, because a couple of Boston men asked him to come down."

He had met these men in Bangor, it appeared.

"They 'lowed I uz a side-show," Jed told Chet. "I knowed they thought so, but long as they paid my way, I did n't mind. Went along down and did my business at the bank. Then they took me to supper at a tavern and tried to git me drunk; got drunk theirselves. Then we went to a show. Say, Chet, they was the funniest man in that show I ever see. I set between these two, and they kep' a-looking at me, and I was like to bust, I wanted to laugh so

man. But I did n't much as grin; it near killed me. Say, when I got into bed that night, I like' to died laughing, just thinking about him. But they did n't know that."

"I asked him," Chet explained, "why he did n't want to laugh in the theater, and he says, 'I would n't give them two that much satisfaction.' So he saved it up till he got alone. That's how mean he was."

This man had been born in Fraternity, and his brother Nehemiah and his sisters Abigail and Deborah always lived in the town. No one of them was ever to marry. They were dwelling together in the house where their father and mother had lived when Jed came back to Fraternity and settled

[graphic][merged small][merged small]

ingeniously, sharing the secret with no living man.

Jed was already old, and his sixtieth birthday came in 1881. He had bought a little hillside farm, where he lived alone; but in that year his loneliness became oppressive to him, and he sought out his brother 'Miah with a proposal that he had carefully planned.

Before 'Miah's eyes old Jed spread out all the kingdoms of the world. That is to say, he showed his brother the tin box of notes, showed all his wealth to the other man. He was worth at this time twenty thousand dollars, a fortune in Fraternity.

"It 's this a-way, 'Miah," he explained. "I 'm a-getting old, and mighty feeble sometimes. Can't do for myself like I used. I could hire somebody to take care of me, but that don't look just right. Seems like what I got ought to stay in the family, 'Miah. Don't it look that way to you?"

It did. 'Miah had no love for his brother; there was no basis for any such love, since Jed had gouged him as hungrily as he had gouged other men. Nevertheless, there was in Jed's money a powerful conciliatory factor, and 'Miah, though weaker, was as avaricious as the older man. He asked:

"What you heading at, anyway?" "This here, 'Miah," Jed replied. "You come on over here and fix to live with me and look out for me. You're younger than I be, and I ain't a well man, anyway. You do for me long as I live, and I'll fix it so you heir my prop'ty. Ain't that a right fair thing?"

'Miah did not consider over-long. The duties proposed to him were burdensome, but the rewards were proportionately great. He did insist on a formal will, which Jed drew and signed

and delivered into 'Miah's custody. Thereafter the younger brother moved from the home farm, leaving the sisters to dwell there alone with a hired man for help, and came to live with the old miser.

Jed began almost at once to prosper on this care. He contributed to the support of the household nothing whatever.

""T ain't in the bargain," he insisted when 'Miah complained. "And, besides," he added, "all I got is a-going to come to you." He contributed nothing, yet demanded everything: victuals of his choice and plenty of them, the daily paper to read, and a regular allowance of gin. He demanded these things, and got them. Passers used to see him sitting in the sun before the house door, as slothful as a serpent, his little black eyes twisting this way and that in a beady fashion that completed the likeness. He had been spare and thin; he began to put on flesh. But as the angles of his frame became more rounded, the edges of his tongue became keener, and he cut 'Miah with sharp words day by day.

'Miah was a spineless man; nevertheless the hour came when he rebelled. It is impossible to say how this ultimate dissension was begun; the sources of such quarrels are often lost in the flood of recriminations which arise from them. 'Miah, in a futile, shrill-voiced manner, lost his temper, but Jed did not. The older man goaded the other with edged words, observing with malign amusement his brother's rising anger, till 'Miah suddenly became silent, turned away, and without word began to gather his few belongings. Jed, having watched him for a time, asked:

[graphic][subsumed][merged small]

"What you a-doing, 'Miah?" "I got enough of you," 'Miah told him, sullenly. "I 'm going back home."

Persisting in a stubborn silence, he continued his preparations all that morning; and Jed, at first jeering and incredulous, was forced to accept the other's intention. It was in this crisis that he conceived the artifice that was to become a part of his life. 'Miah, in the bedroom, heard Jed groan; he paid no heed, and his brother groaned again. This time the younger man came to the door and looked at Jed, suspiciously. The miser was bent forward in his chair, hugging himself and groaning more and more. 'Miah asked petulantly:

"What's the matter with you?" And Jed gasped, as though in agony:

"Git Doctor Crapo, 'Miah. I'm a-dying. I got a turrible pain in my stummick."

[merged small][ocr errors]

The doctor nodded, and he and 'Miah went out of the room together. 'Miah took this chance to ask:

"How about it, Doc?"

"May be bad," the doctor told him. "Looks like the beginning of one of those torturing deaths that some men die. Months, maybe years, of that pain, getting worse all the time. And -his heart is bad."

"He'll maybe die?"

"Might go any time," said Doctor Crapo, and drove away.

Now, this was in 1883. Chet McAusland had recorded the first appearance of that pain in the old note

'Miah studied him; he said incredu- book that I still held in my hand. lously:

"It's belly-ache."

The effect of Jed's artifice was that 'Miah did not, after all, desert his

Jed wagged his wicked old head and brother. Actuated by the avaricious groaned again.

"All right, 'Miah; but git the doctor, anyhow. I'm a-dying, sure."

There was always a chance that this might be true. 'Miah sent for the doctor, and Doctor Crapo, a young man then and not so wise as he would later be, questioned Jed, and took pulse and temperature, and said with some solemnity:

"I don't know. You 've got no fever, but your heart is jumpy. I guess- Well, you 're getting along, you know. If this pain is what you say, it 's just the beginning of one of those ailments that come on old men sometimes. Nothing I can do for it at your age."

thought that since he had endured three years of servitude for no return, he might as well endure another period, now that the reward was in sight, he stayed on at the little hillside farm. The next spring he died and was laid away. away. Old Jed had read his brother well; he grinned to himself because he had been able to buy 'Miah's services with empty promises and nothing more, and the incident gave him confidence. He lived for a few months alone.

§ 3

But in 1885 Jed's native sloth rebelled at the necessity for tending his own bodily needs, and he sent for his

sister Abigail, who lived with Deborah on their father's farm-sent for Abbie, and showed her, as he had showed 'Miah, that tin box of ugly treasuretrove.

"I'm a-getting feeble, Abbie," he told her, plaintively. "I'm too old to

Ruis Mora

"I'm a-getting feeble, Abbie'"

do for myself." With some inward With some inward appreciation of the satiric drama of the situation, he parroted the phrases he had used to 'Miah four years before. "I could hire somebody, but that don't look right. What I got ought to stay in the family. You come and take care of me."

This spinster sister was a humble little woman without strength or assertiveness; she yielded not from greed, but from lack of strength to resist his insistence, and so came to the farm upon the hill. Chet, telling the story, struck his fist upon his knee at the recollection.

"There's nobody knows what he put her through, and Deborah after her," he told me. "That old heathen had to have his own way or he 'd raise holy Ned; and he got it. Abbie stood it

longer than 'Miah; she never did kick up and threaten to leave him. But after two years she took sick and discouraged-like, and wanted to quit and go home. Then Jed he begun to say again how sick he was; made her fetch the doctor again."

days, Doc?"

This time, it appeared, Doctor Crapo had been wholly convinced of the miser's honesty.

"A pain like that," he told Jed, "is always a sure sign. I've seen them go. Specially men that eat heavy, like you do, and that get fat as they go along. You 're going to have that pain the rest of your life, and worse all the time."

Abbie was in the room, and Jed asked plaintively:

"Hev I got to suffer like this here for days and

[graphic]
[blocks in formation]
« AnkstesnisTęsti »