An older brother of Hetty and Eldon drew his pipe slowly from his mouth and looked impressively upon the company. Jim Maise had never received the "larnin" of which the younger members of the family boasted, but he had what he himself fondly called "hoss sense." At any rate he was always listened to attentively as befitted an eldest son.
"Wall," he drawled, "I reckon this here post-office affair don't come too late for us to get even with some of the things the Greys have done to us. Only it don't strike near enough home. Holner ain't nothing but a son-in-law of the old man's half-brother. Now if we could strike a blow to Robert Grey, or his sister Kitty and her family, it would be something like. Nothin' real bad but just humblin'-like."
Periwinkle's heart beat faster at the mention of Robert Grey in this connection and Hetty stirred nervously in her chair. She had it in her power, as they all knew, to humiliate Kitty Farwell and incidentally Kitty's brother, Robert Grey. Hetty had not forgotten that Kitty was quite influential in causing the final "break" between herself and Robert. When she spoke her voice sounded strange and hard.
"The mortgage on Mrs. Farwell's place is due in October," she suggested rather hesitatingly.
"I was coming to that, Hetty," cried Jeoffrey eagerly. "Who holds the mortgage now that Myra is gone. It always seemed to me to be mighty generous of your ma, to will all her property to Myra when your pa disinherited her."
"I hold it," replied Miss Hetty tersely, "as legal guardian of Myra's children and heirs."
"Kitty cannot pay it?" questioned her brother Eldon quietly.
He and Mrs. Farwell had been playmates and youthful sweethearts.
"Hardly," replied his sister with a grim smile. "Kitty is scarcely worth the eight hundred it demands. Since that shiftless husband of hers died, she has all she can do to make ends meet and keep her three children together."
At this heartless reply a smile of ill-disguised contempt might have been detected on the face of at least one of the men present. But as he was only a "poor relation" dependent for his very means of livelihood upon the generosity of Jeoffrey and Eldon Maise he wisely remained silent.