“That's what I'd like to have, you, or somebody else tell me,” exclaimed the old lady, tartly. “I ain't got no more use for a farm than a cat has for two tails!”
“But—but isn't it a good farm?” queried Hiram, puzzled.
“How do I know?” snapped the boarding house mistress. “I wouldn't know one farm from another, exceptin' two can't be in exactly the same spot. Oh! do you mean, could I sell it?”
“No——”
“The lawyer advised me not to sell just now. He said something about the state of the real estate market in that section. Prices would be better in a year or two. And then, the old place is mighty run down.”
“That's what I mean,” Hiram hastened to say. “Has it been cropped to death? Is the soil worn out? Can't you run it and make something out of it?”
“For pity's sake!” ejaculated the good lady, “how should I know? And I couldn't run it—I shouldn't know how.
“I've got a neighbor-woman in the house just now to 'tend to things—and that's costin' me a dollar and a half a week. And there'll be taxes to pay, and—and—Well, I just guess I'll have to try and sell it now and take what I can get.
“Though that lawyer says that if the place was fixed up a little and crops put in it would make a thousand dollars' difference in the selling price. That is, after a year or two.
“But bless us and save us” cried Mrs. Atterson, “I'd be swamped with expenses before that time.”