“Don’t be unjust, father. I appreciate all you’ve done for me. But I simply can’t stand it on the farm—and I won’t.”
The old man was still impassive.
“No? Well, you’re of age. Your time’s your own. There is no law to compel you to work, exceptin’ the law of self-preservation. If you choose to go gallivantin’ round the country like old Hiram Posten, with a needle an’ a Jacob’s staff, runnin’ out people’s back yards for ’em, it ain’t nobody’s business but your own. But men that stay on my farm must work on my farm.”
Charlie stood for a moment gazing at his father intently.
“Does that mean,” he said at last, “that I must give up my surveying or leave my home?”
The old man turned on his questioner suddenly, aroused at last from his seeming impassiveness.
“Look here, young man,” he said, “I’ve got the best four hundred acres o’ land in Meredith County. After I’m through with it it’s yours if you want it. But you can’t get it by runnin’ land lines in Jackson County all summer, an’ huntin’ muskrats in Beaver all winter. If you want my farm, you’ve got to earn it, an’ the only way you can earn it is to stay home an’ work it like your father an’ your gran’father did before you. Now, that’s the last word. Take it or leave it as you choose.”
Charlie took no time for thought, no time to counsel with himself. As quickly and decisively as though he had been putting aside a toy he replied:—
“Very well, father; I leave it.”
For one moment Abner Pickett stood aghast. That any one, least of all his own son, whose ancestral pride should have made such a thing impossible, could throw away so coolly, so carelessly, a gift like this, the condition of obtaining which should have been a joy to him instead of a burden—it was simply and wholly incomprehensible. Without a word he turned on his heel and started up the road toward the barn.