“Meanin’, of course, that you hold the lien on her prop’ty,” he hazarded. “But you don’t”—and he paused to chuckle to himself—“hold no lien on what she’s propos in’ to sell to the highest bidder?”
“What do you mean?” demanded Jarvis.
His tone was menacing, and he fixed angry eyes, red from sleeplessness, on the old auctioneer.
“You’ll either explain yourself,” he said, “or—you’ll get no more business from me, to-day or any other day.”
Mr. Bellows expectorated violently in the general direction of the opposite wall.
“I ain’t,” he declared valiantly, “afeard of no threats, nor yet of nobody. But I’m goin’ to tell you, ’cause it’s you that’s drove her to it, an’ you’d ought to know what sort of girl she is. I had three-quarters of a notion to tell you anyhow, an’ I tol’ m’ wife so, when I found it was you that held the lien on her house an’ furniture. Business is business with me as well as any other man; but I’d be ashamed to drive a woman to the point of sellin’ herself.”
“Selling herself!” echoed Jarvis.
The observant eyes of Mr. Bellows were upon him, as he fell back a pace or two and strove to steady himself.
“That’s what I said. Yes, sir; she asked me right here in this shop to sell her at public auction. ‘I’ve lost everythin’,’ she says; ‘but I’ve got myself, an’ I’ll sell that, an’ pay what I owe.’”