“I g-got it in the beginning because I knew it would come in handy. I d-didn’t know just how I’d use it. But I know now.”
“How?”
“I’m g-goin’ to make Mr. Skip pay himself part of that five hundred dollars. Wish I could make him pay himself all of it.”
“What method of procedure have you chosen?” asked Mr. Sturgis.
“I f-figgered it out you could get Skip over here and tell him about the lease and make him pungle over. You can sell the lease, can’t you? Can’t you sell it to him like it was a horse or cow or a p-piece of property?”
“A lease, my young friend, is a piece of property and is so recognized by law. We can follow your suggestion. How much do you consider your lease to be worth?”
“H-haven’t any idee, but we want to git all we can. Hundred dollars at least.”
“I am confident we can secure a greater sum than that. Possibly two hundred dollars.”
“F-fine,” says Mark, and his eyes glistened. “We won’t let him know we have anything to do with it—not now. But won’t he be hoppin’ mad when he finds out he’s gone and bought that chattel mortgage and then has had to p-pay it himself? Won’t he, though? Oh, my!”
The scheme hadn’t been very clear to me, but I saw it now. Mark could make Skip move out of his store, and Skip would lose a lot of money if he had to move, because there wasn’t any place else for him to go in Wicksville. The only way he could stay and run his store was to buy that lease from Mark. Well, sir, I don’t know how Mark thinks up schemes like that, but he does. This was such a bully scheme, because it couldn’t help working. I made up my mind I’d ask him how he came to think of it, because a fellow his age hasn’t business understanding about leases and law and such things.