“You used to snub Roger awfully,” he said; “and if he was like anybody else, he wouldn’t forget it in a hurry; but, then, he isn’t like anybody else. He’s the best-hearted and most generous chap I ever knew.”
“Generous!” Mrs. Walter Scott repeated, with a tinge of sarcasm in her voice.
“Yes, generous,” said Frank. “He has always allowed me more than the will said he must, and he’s helped me out of more than forty scrapes. I say, again, he is the most generous chap I ever knew.”
“I hope he will prove it in a few weeks, when you are of age, by giving you more than that five thousand named in the will,” was Mrs. Walter Scott’s next remark. “Frank,”—and she lowered her voice lest the walls should hear and report,—“we are poor. This house and three thousand dollars are all we have in the world; and unless Roger does something handsome for you, there is no alternative for us but to mortgage the house, or sell it, and acknowledge our poverty to the world. I have sold your father’s watch and his diamond cross.”
“Mother!” Frank exclaimed, his tone indicative of his surprise and indignation.
“I had to pay Bridget’s wages, and defray the expense of that little party I gave last winter,” was the lady’s apology, to which Frank responded:
“Confound your party! People as poor as we are have no business with parties. Sell father’s watch! and I was intending to claim it myself when I came of age. It’s too bad! You’ll be selling me next! I’ll be hanged if it isn’t deuced inconvenient to be so poor! I mean to go to Millbank and stay. I’m seldom troubled with the blues when there.”
“I wish you could get me an invitation to go there, too,” Mrs. Walter Scott said. “It will look so queer to stay in the city all summer, as I am likely to do. I should suppose Roger would want somebody besides old Hester to look after Magdalen. She must be a large girl now.”
It was the first sign of interest Mrs. Walter Scott had shown in Magdalen, and Frank, who liked the girl, followed it up by expatiating upon her good qualities, telling how bright and smart she was, and how handsome she would be if only she could be dressed decently. Then he told her of Roger’s intention to send her to school, and after a few more remarks arose from the table and began his preparations for Millbank. Frank was usually very light-hearted and hopeful, but there was a weight on his spirits, and his face wore a gloomy look all the way from New York to Hartford. But it began to clear as Millbank drew near. There was his Eldorado, and by the time the station was reached, he had forgotten the impending mortgage, and his father’s watch, and his own poverty. It all came back, however, with a thought of the will, and he found himself wishing most devoutly that the missing document could be found, or else that Roger would do the handsome thing, and come down with a few thousands on his twenty-first birthday, now only three weeks in the distance. The sight of Magdalen, however, in her new white ruffled apron, with her hair curling in rings about her head, and her great round eyes dancing with joy, diverted his mind from Roger and the will, and scattered the blues at once.
“Oh; Mag, is that you?” he exclaimed, coming quickly to her side. “How bright and pretty you look!”