The first night after they arrived home, Bertie said,—
“Now prick up your ears and hear the news. Ned, you tell.”
“No, you tell; you can do it best.”
“James, can these two places above and below be bought, and for how much?”
“For two dollars an acre. I have got the preemption” (right to purchase before another) “of the one above.”
“Then you must buy ‘em,—the upper one for me, and the lower for Ned Conly.”
Emily, during this conversation, sat with clasped hands; and then running to Bert, taking him by both shoulders, said,—
“Bertie Whitman, are you telling the truth, or are you fooling?”
“The truth and nothing but the truth, my dear girl. Walter has concluded not to go to college. Your father has given the farm to him to take care of the old folks; my father is going to do the same by Peter. Ned and I have got to shirk for ourselves, and are going to shirk up to Lycoming; that is, by and by, but we want to make sure of the land before we go back.”
Ned Conly was an adept at handling tools, and as James had the materials for the house all on the spot, the cellar prepared, and the logs hewn, they put up the house, moved into it, and harvested the potatoes and corn before the boys went back. Ned Conly was engaged to Jane Gifford. He married her, and came on to his place the next year. Bert came the next year after Ned, built a log house on his place, and a saw-mill, as his father supplied him with abundant means, and boarded with James three years, when he married the daughter of Henry Hawkes, a neighbor of James; and in the course of five years more Arthur Nevins and John Edibean settled six miles above them on the creek.