“This is not what we came to ask about,” said Josie. “Please tell us whether our house and the insurance money would be mamma’s if this plan were not adopted—if the courts went on and settled the estate in the usual way?”
“Yes,” said I, “the law gives her that, and justly. For the creditors knew all about the law when they took those bonds. So you need have no qualms of conscience on that.”
“As none of it belongs to me,” said Josie, “I shall leave all that to mamma. I avoid the necessity of settling it by ceasing to be ‘the richest heiress in this part of the West’—one of the uses of adversity. But to proceed. Mamma says that there is a corporation, or something, forming to pay our debts and take our property, and that it will take a hundred thousand dollars more to pay the debts than the estate is worth. I must understand why this corporation should do this. I can see that it will save pa’s good name in the business world, and save us from public bankruptcy; but ought we to be saved these things at such a cost? And can we permit—a corporation—or any one, to do this for us?”
Mr. Elkins nodded to me to speak.
“My dear,” said I, “it’s another illustration of the truth that no man liveth unto himself alone—”
She shrank, as if she feared some fresh hurt was about to be touched, and I saw that it was the second part of the text the anticipation of which gave her pain. Quotation is sometimes ill for a green wound.
“The fact is,” I went on, “that things in Lattimore are not in condition to bear a shock—general money conditions, I mean, you know.”
“I know,” she said, nodding assent; “I can see that.”
“Your father did a very large business for a time,” I continued; “and when he sold lands he took some cash in payment, and for the balance notes of the various purchasers, secured by mortgages on the properties. Many of these persons are mere adventurers, who bought on speculation, and when their first notes came due failed to pay. Now if you had these notes, you could hold them, or foreclose the mortgages, and, beyond being disappointed in getting the money, no harm would be done.”
“I understand,” said Josie. “I knew something of this before.”