He arranged with Adoniram Judd that he should go to the shop the next morning, then bade him good-night, and turned his own steps thither.
When he came in sight of Ozias Lamb's shop, its window was throwing a long beam of light across the field creeping with dry grass before the frosty wind. When Jerome opened the door, he started to see Ozias seated upon his bench, his head bowed over and hidden upon his idle hands. Jerome closed the door, then stood a moment irresolute, staring at his uncle's dejected figure. “What's the matter, Uncle Ozias?” he asked.
Ozias did not speak, but made a curious, repellent motion with his bowed shoulders.
“Are you sick?”
Again Ozias seemed to shunt him out of the place with that speaking motion of his shoulder.
Jerome went close to him. “Uncle Ozias, I want to know what is the matter?” he said, then started, for suddenly Ozias raised his face and looked at him, his eyes wild under his shaggy grizzle of hair, his mouth twisted in a fierce laugh. “Want to know, do ye?” he cried—“want to know? Well, I'll tell ye. Look at me hard; I'm a sight. Look at me. Here's a man, 'most threescore years and ten, who's been willin' to work, an' has worked, an' 'ain't been considered underwitted, who's been strugglin' to keep a roof over his head an' his wife's, an' bread in their two mouths; jest that, no more. He 'ain't had any children; nobody but himself an' his wife, an' she contented with next to nothin'. Jest a roof an' bread for them—jest that; an' he an able-bodied man, that's worked like a dog—jest that; an' he's got to give it up. Look at him, he's a sight for wise men an' fools.” Ozias laughed.
“What on earth do you mean, Uncle Ozias?”
“Simon Basset is goin' to foreclose to-morrow.”
Jerome stared at his uncle incredulously. “Why, I thought you had earned plenty to keep the interest up of late years!” he said.
“There was more than present interest to pay; there was back interest, and I've been behind on taxes, and there was an old doctor bill, when I had the fever; an' that wa'n't all—I never told ye, nor anybody. I was fool enough to sign a note for George Henry Green, in Westbrook, some years ago. He come to me with tears in his eyes, said he wouldn't care so much if it wa'n't for his wife an' children; he'd got to raise the money, an' couldn't get nobody to sign his note. I lost every dollar of it. It's been all I could do to pay up, an' I couldn't keep even with the interest. I knew it was comin'.”