"I wanted to ask ye a favor about Mr.—about—Jack Folinsbee," began Peg hurriedly. "He's ailin' agin, and is mighty low. And he's losin' a heap o' money here and thar, and mostly to you. You cleaned him out of two thousand dollars last night—all he had."
"Well?" said the gambler coldly.
"Well, I thought as you woz a friend o' mine, I'd ask ye to let up a little on him," said Peg with an affected laugh. "You kin do it. Don't let him play with ye."
"Mistress Margaret Moffat," said Jack with lazy deliberation, taking off his watch and beginning to wind it up, "ef you're that much stuck after Jack Folinsbee, you kin keep him off of me much easier than I kin. You're a rich woman. Give him enough money to break my bank, or break himself for good and all; but don't keep him foolin' round me in hopes to make a raise. It don't pay, Mistress Moffat—it don't pay!"...
"When Jim Byways left me this yer property," she began, looking cautiously around, "he left it to me on conditions; not conditions ez waz in his written will, but conditions ez waz spoken. A promise I made him in this very room, Mr. Hamlin—this very room, and on that very bed you're sittin' on, in which he died."
Like most gamblers, Mr. Hamlin was superstitious. He rose hastily from the bed, and took a chair beside the window. The wind shook it as if the discontented spirit of Mr. Byways were without, reenforcing his last injunction.
"I don't know if you remember him," said Peg feverishly. "He was a man ez hed suffered. All that he loved—wife, fammerly, friends—had gone back on him. He tried to make light of it afore folks; but with me, being a poor gal, he let himself out. I never told anybody this. I don't know why he told me; I don't know," continued Peggy with a sniffle, "why he wanted to make me unhappy too. But he made me promise that if he left me his fortune, I'd never, never—so help me God!—never share it with any man or woman that I loved. I didn't think it would be hard to keep that promise then, Mr. Hamlin, for I was very poor, and hedn't a friend nor a living bein' that was kind to me but him."
"But you've as good as broken your promise already," said Hamlin. "You've given Jack money, as I know."
"Only what I made myself. Listen to me, Mr. Hamlin. When Jack proposed to me, I offered him about what I kalkilated I could earn myself. When he went away, and was sick and in trouble, I came here and took this hotel. I knew that by hard work I could make it pay. Don't laugh at me, please. I did work hard, and did make it pay—without takin' one cent of the fortin'. And all I made, workin' by night and day, I gave to him; I did, Mr. Hamlin. I ain't so hard to him as you think, tho I might be kinder, I know."
Mr. Hamlin rose, deliberately resumed his coat, watch, hat, and overcoat. When he was completely drest again, he turned to Peg.