"You mean you want to put a morgidge on the—on the farm?" he asked, slowly.
"How else can I get the money, 'Gene? A small mortgage won't be so bad, will it? What is the farm worth?" She was feverish with excitement.
"It's not the best of land, you know, and there ain't no improvements," he said, still more deliberately. "You might sell the place for $800, but I doubt it."
"I won't sell it; it must be kept for my boy. But I can borrow a little on it, can't I? Wouldn't David Strong let me have $200 on it?"
"Good Lord, Justine, don't put a morgidge on the place!" he cried. "That will be the end of it. It's the way it always goes. Don't do anything like that."
"There is no other way to get the money and I—I am going to Jud," she said, determinedly, and he saw the light in her eye.
In the end he promised to secure the money for her, and he did. The next day Martin Grimes loaned Eugene Crawley $150, taking a chattel mortgage on a farm wagon and harness and the two big bay horses that stood in Justine's barn. At first she refused to take the money, but his insistence prevailed, and three days later she and her boy left Glenville for Chicago and Jud. She promised to acquaint Crawley with Jud's true condition and their plans for the future.
Crawley said good-bye to her as she climbed into Harve Crose's wagon on the day of departure. He wished her luck in a harsh, unnatural tone, and abruptly turned to the barn. For hours he sat in the cold mow, disconsolate, exalted. His horses stamping below were mortgaged! Lost to him, no doubt, but he gloried in the sacrifice. He had given his fortune to gratify her longing to be with the man she loved.
At sunset he trudged to the tollgate. An unreasoning longing filled his lonely heart. When he asked for the mail there was uppermost in his mind the hope of a letter from her, although she had been gone not more than five hours. His loneliness increased when Mrs. Hardesty said that there was no mail for him or Justine. For the first time in months he felt the old longing for drink.
"Jestine gone to Chickago fer a visit er to stay?" asked Jim Hardesty, when Crawley joined the crowd that lounged about the big sheet-iron stove in the store.