Spring had opened, and the farmers were very busy. Once Mr. Himes would have been as much so as any, but now he seemed to feel that he had something else to attend to of more importance than the cultivation of his land.
Miriam Heath, out in the fields one bright morning with Sandy McAllister and Barney Nolan, overseeing and directing their operations there, heard aloud “Halloo, Miss Heath!” and turning her head, saw Mr. Himes waving his hand to her from the road.
“I must see what he wants,” she said to Sandy, whose attention had been arrested by the call as well as her own. “I think you can go on very well without me now.” And turning her horse about, she rode up to the fence that separated the field from the road, and with a courteous greeting to her caller, asked if he would go into the house.
“Well, yes; p’r’aps I might as well,” he replied, “if you can spare time fer a little business talk.”
“I must always do that,” she answered. “I was very sorry to hear, some time ago, that you, too, had been robbed.”
“Yes,” he returned, with a heavy sigh; “and them rascals made a bigger haul than they did here—got the savin’s o’ years. I hain’t much left but the farm and the stock. I hope you’ve got your notes back, Miss Heath. Fact is, I want that money awful bad now. I’d be glad if you’d pay the whole thing off, principal and interest, and take up your mortgage.”
“I wish I could, indeed,” she said, leading the way into the house and giving him a chair, “but it is utterly impossible. We have had no trace of the notes yet; and though we have used the closest economy, I have but one hundred dollars for you now. I will give you a check on the Prairieville bank for it.”
“Only a hundred! Why, that will leave fifty back of the interest due last fall—six months ago!”
“I know it,” she said, with a deeply troubled look; “but if you will only have patience, I am sure we will pay it all in time.”
“I don’t want to be hard on ye, but, as I said afore, I do want that money awful bad,” he answered, with a scowl. “I mean to leave the State, and I’m tryin’ to close things up so’s to take all I have with me.”