“You mean that the boy’s guardian has neglected this to injure the title to the property?”
“When the boy comes o’ age, the farm’ll be his. He ain’t no farmer, nur don’t want to be. He’ll put the track up fur sale. Who’ll buy it? Nobody—exceptin’ the gardeen—Mr. Lawyer Cyrus Stockwell, an’ at his own price.”
“Well,” asked Mr. Elder, leaning back into his chair, “what good will it do him? Won’t be worth any more to him, will it?”
“Onless he turns around an’ finds the persons ’at kin give him a title. But he won’t. Them folks is right here. They air a goin’ to make a deed right here this mornin’, an’ it’ll run to Bud Wilson. They air a goin’ to sign the dockyment right here that’ll make Bud’s farm worth one hundred and twenty-five dollars an acre o’ any man’s money.”
Then, while the interested banker followed old “Stump’s” explanation eagerly, Mr. Camp told how Jack Stanley and his wife, the direct heirs of William Reed and his wife, who had failed to properly transfer the property to Bud’s father, were ready and even eager to see justice done. They were prepared to sign a deed at once.
The keen, business man drew a long breath, and looked long and hard at the silent gypsies.
“Camp,” he said at last, “how’d you work this out?”
“Jack Stanley” spoke, for the first time.
In his rough way he told of his brief acquaintance with Bud from the time the boy came to him at midnight for coffee; how Bud had interfered to protect his mother-in-law from insult; how the boy had treated them as “white people,” and finally recalled to the bank officer and fair director how Bud had come to the rescue of himself and old Madame Zecatacas when they had been so unjustly arrested.