“Miss Reed?” said the woman “No. She ain’t here any more.”
Gault stopped.
“What do you mean?” he asked. “Colonel Reed lives here.”
“Not now,” said the woman, struggling to her feet. “He did until last week. We bought the place off of him just seven days ago, and moved in Tuesday.”
“Do you mean that he has sold it and gone away?”
“That’s it. We rushed it through, both of us. He wanted to sell ’bout as much as we wanted to buy, so there wasn’t much time wasted on either side.”
“Had he thought of selling it for any length of time?”
“I can’t rightly say as to that. We’ve had our eyes on it for the past five years. My husband—he’s Robson, the dry-goods dealer, on Third, just below here—was pretty well satisfied that the colonel couldn’t hang on to it forever. ’Bout three years ago he offered him three thousand. But the old man wouldn’t hear of it. Said he wouldn’t even raise a mortgage on it, as it was all he had to leave to his daughter when he died. But we knew he couldn’t hold out much longer. He didn’t have no work, nor nothing to live on. Miss Reed she made a little, but not enough to run everything, and—”
“Yes—I know all about that. When did you say they left?”
“On Monday, and we moved in Tuesday. Saturday the old man came round to Mr. Robson’s place and said he’d let him have the house for anything he chose to give. There ain’t nothing mean about Mr. Robson. He could ’a’ beat the colonel down to ’most anything, but he said he’d give him two thousand cash down, and the old man just jumped at it. Mr. Robson said it would ’a’ been business to get the colonel to a lower figure, and he said he supposed he would ’a’ done it if it hadn’t been for the daughter. She was sick, and the old man said he’d got to have money to take her away.”