"I wonder, really," he mused, "why I didn't talk to her as I did to the others, for I certainly wanted to bad enough."
Chapter VI
Westerfelt's room at the stable was at the head of a flight of steps leading up from the office. It had only a single window, but it commanded a partial view of several roads leading into the village, and a sparse row of houses on the opposite side of the street. In front of the stable stood a blacksmith shop, and next to it, on the right, the only store in the village. The store building had two rooms, the front being used for dry-goods, groceries, and country produce, the one in the rear as the residence of the storekeeper. Next to the store, in a sort of lean-to, whitewashed shed with green shutters, was a bar-room. Farther on in this row, opposite the jail of the place, and partially hidden by the thinning foliage of sycamore, chestnut, and mulberry trees, was the hotel. It was the only two-storied building in the village. It had dormer windows in the roof and a long veranda in front.
Somehow this building interested Westerfelt more than any of the others. He told himself it was because he intended to get his meals there. Finally he decided, as he was not to dine that day with the Bradleys, that he ought to go over at once and speak to the landlady about his board. As he arranged his cravat before the little walnut-framed mirror, which the stable-boys in placing his furniture had hung on the wall, together with a hairbrush and a comb tied to strings, he wondered, with no little pleasurable excitement, if Harriet Floyd had anything to do with the management of the house, and if he would be apt to meet her that morning.
Descending to the office on his way out, he found a young man writing at a desk. It was William Washburn, the book-keeper for the former owners of the livery-stable, whom Westerfelt had retained on Bradley's recommendation. Washburn was copying accounts from a ledger on to sheets of paper.
"How are they running?" asked Westerfelt, looking over the young man's shoulder.
"Lots of 'em hain't wuth the paper they are on," replied Washburn. "The old firm knowed everybody in creation, an' never could refuse a soul. When you bought the accounts you didn't buy gold dollars."
"I know that, but Bradley said he thought I might collect a good many of them."