“It was very generous in her,” declared Mildred.
“Was it? Well, that’s a matter of opinion. But I regard her gift of this ranch as the first step to perpetual pauperdom. She tossed the land at me, shuffled me off, and then expected me to make a living.”
“Can’t you do that?” asked Mildred wonderingly.
“Make a living on a California ranch!” he said, as if astonished.
“Others do,” she asserted.
“There is no other just like your humble servant,” he assured her, again struggling with the cork. “I can’t grow enough lemons—it’s a lemon ranch she handed me—to pay expenses. The first year I decorated my estate with a mortgage; had to have an automobile, you know. The second year I put another plaster on to pay the interest of the first mortgage and a few scattering debts. Third year, the third patch; fourth year, the usual thing. Fifth year—that’s this one—the money sharks balked. They said the ranch is loaded to its full capacity. So, I’ll have to sell some lemons.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry!” cried Mildred.
“So am I, thank you. Stupid thing, selling lemons. But the wolf’s at the door and all I can do is shoot lemons at the brute. Lemons! Wasn’t it tart of the dear mother to load me with such an acidulous estate? Perhaps she imagined it would make me assiduous—eh?”
“Your mother hoped you would turn over a new leaf and—and redeem your past,” said the girl.
“Well, it’s too late to do that now. I can’t redeem the past without redeeming the ranch, and that’s impossible,” he declared with a grin. “But tell me, please, how you happen to be so deep in my mother’s confidence.”