This estimate did not exactly agree with the one Lyman had recently expressed of Mark, but he did not think it necessary to be consistent.
"Twenty thousand dollars!" he repeated, and his nephew almost starving here in Chicago. Oh, it was a cunning scheme to buy me off for a paltry sum, and give a free field to that boy. That's a pretty way for a man to treat his only living relation.
"But who could have put it into his head that his grandson was alive? I presume the little beggar has kicked the bucket before this. If I only could get hold of him, I would make the old man pay handsomely for his return."
The chances, however, did not seem very flattering, and Lyman had no money to expend in searching for the boy, apart from the doubt whether he was still living. Gradually a new idea came to him. He might pick up some boy who would answer the purpose, whom he could palm off on his uncle as his grandson. True, it would be raising up a rival heir; but he was thoroughly persuaded that in no case did he himself stand any chance of succeeding to his uncle's property.
"It will be worth something," he muttered, "to cut out that country boy. All I have to do, is to find a boy who is without relatives, and I can concoct some story that will impose upon Uncle Anthony. That little match boy, for instance! Why wouldn't he do?"
Lyman became so excited by his castle building, that he determined to lose no time in carrying out his design. He left the tavern, and retraced his steps to the place where he had encountered the match boy. Johnny, after eating his dinner, had resumed his business, and was within a block of the same place offering his wares to the passers by.
He was a little worried by Tim's threat to expose his extravagant dinner to the old woman with whom he lived, but persistently refused to buy off his persecutor.
"I say, little boy, what's your name?"
Johnny turned round at these words, and recognized in the man addressing him, the one with whom he had already had trouble. His face showed the fear which he not unnaturally felt.
"Don't be frightened, my boy!" said Lyman, with an ingratiating smile. "I am afraid I was rough to you this morning. Don't mind it! I was worried about my business affairs, and didn't mean what I said. Shake hands, and let us be friends."