“Your mother has given me notes for unpaid interest.”
“To you and Captain Barber?” repeated Morey, sitting up and looking at the man beside him.
“Yes.”
“And you and Captain Barber will own our home?”
“It would naturally be that way.”
“How much do we owe you?” asked the boy suddenly and leaning forward in the evening gloom.
Major Carey coughed and arose nervously.
“More than you can repay, my lad. More than I like to say.”
“But I’m going to pay it,” said Morey in a desperate voice, laying his hand on the Major’s arm to detain him. “I don’t know how, but I’m going to do it. You think I’m a fool. I have been. If I hadn’t been soaked full of ideas that I got from every one around me I’d have known. And don’t you believe I got ’em all from my mother. I got ’em from everything and everybody around here. But I understand now. I might have understood long ago if I hadn’t been living the life every one lives around here.”