The Store Boy

CHAPTER XXXI MR. JACKSON RECEIVES A CALL

“Sup­pose we join forces, Ben,” said Mr. Tay­lor fa­mil­iar­ly.

“How do you mean?”

"We will join forces against this man Jack­son. He wants to swin­dle both of us--that is, those whom we rep­re­sent.

“I am will­ing to work with you” an­swered Ben, who had been fa­vor­ably im­pressed by the ap­pear­ance and frank­ness of his trav­el­ing com­pan­ion.

“Then sup­pose to-​mor­row morn­ing--it is too late to-​day--we call over and see the old ras­cal.”

“I would rather not have him know on what er­rand I come, just at first.”

“That is in ac­cor­dance with my own plans. You will go as my com­pan­ion. He will take you for my son, or nephew, and, while I am ne­go­ti­at­ing, you can watch and judge for your­self.”

“I like the plan,” said Ben.

“When he finds out who you are he will feel pret­ty bad­ly sold.”

“He de­serves it.”

The two put up at a coun­try ho­tel, which, though not lux­uri­ous, was tol­er­ably com­fort­able. Af­ter the fa­tigue of his jour­ney, Ben en­joyed a good sup­per and a com­fort­able bed. The evening, how­ev­er, he spent in the pub­lic room of the inn, where he had a chance to lis­ten to the con­ver­sa­tion of a mot­ley crowd, some of them na­tive and res­idents, oth­ers strangers who had been drawn to Cen­ter­ville by the oil dis­cov­er­ies.

“I tell you,” said a long, lank in­di­vid­ual, “Cen­ter­ville's goin' to be one of the smartest places in the Unit­ed States. It's got a big fu­ture be­fore it.”

“That's so,” said a small, wiry man; “but I'm not so much in­ter­est­ed in that as I am in the ques­tion whether or not I've got a big fu­ture be­fore me.”

“You're one of the own­ers of the Hoff­man farm, ain't you?”

“Yes. I wish I owned the whole of it. Still, I've made nigh on to a thou­sand dol­lars durin' the last month for my share of the prof­its. Pret­ty fair, eh?”

“I should say so. You've got a good pur­chase; but there's one bet­ter in my opin­ion.”

“Where's that?”

“Pe­ter Jack­son's farm.”

Here Ben and Mr. Tay­lor be­gan to lis­ten with in­ter­est.

“He hasn't be­gun to work it any, has he?”

“Not much; just enough to find out its val­ue.”

“What's he wait­in' for?”

“There's some New York peo­ple want it. If he can get his price, he'll sell it to them for a good sum down.”

“What does he ask?”

“He wants fifty thou­sand dol­lars.”

“Whew! that's rather stiff­ish. I thought the prop­er­ty be­longed to a la­dy in New York.”

“So it did; but Jack­son says he bought it a year ago.”

“He was lucky.”

Ben and Mr. Tay­lor looked at each oth­er again. It was easy to see the old farmer's game, and to un­der­stand why he was so anx­ious to se­cure the farm, out of which he could make so large a sum of mon­ey.

“He's play­ing a deep game, Ben,” said Tay­lor, when they had left the room.

“Yes; but I think I shall be able to put a spoke in his wheel.”

“I shall be cu­ri­ous to see how he takes it when he finds the ne­go­ti­ation tak­en out of his hands. We'll play with him a lit­tle, as a cat plays with a mouse.”

The next morn­ing, af­ter a sub­stan­tial break­fast, Ben and his new friend took a walk to the farm oc­cu­pied by Pe­ter Jack­son. It was about half a mile away, and when reached gave no in­di­ca­tion of the wealth it was ca­pa­ble of pro­duc­ing. The farm­house was a plain struc­ture near­ly forty years old, bad­ly in need of paint, and the out-​build­ings har­mo­nized with it in ap­pear­ance.

A lit­tle way from the house was a tall, gaunt man, en­gaged in mend­ing a fence. He was dressed in a farmer's blue frock and over­alls, and his gray, stub­by beard seemed to be of a week's growth. There was a crafty, greedy look in his eyes, which over­looked a nose sharp and aquiline. His feet were in­cased in a pair of cowhide boots. He looked in­quir­ing­ly at Tay­lor as he ap­proached, but hard­ly deigned to look at Ben, who prob­ably seemed too in­signif­icant to no­tice. He gave a shrewd guess at the er­rand of the vis­itor, but wait­ed for him to speak first.

“Is this Mr. Jack­son?” asked Tay­lor, with a po­lite bow.

“That's my name, stranger,” an­swered the old man.

“My name is Tay­lor. I wrote to you last week.”

“I got the let­ter,” said Jack­son, go­ing on with his work. It was his plan not to seem too ea­ger but to fight shy in or­der to get his price. Be­sides, though he would have been glad to close the bar­gain on the spot, there was an em­bar­rass­ing dif­fi­cul­ty. The farm was not his to sell, and he was anx­ious­ly await­ing Mrs. Hamil­ton's an­swer to his pro­pos­al.

“She can't have heard of the oil dis­cov­er­ies,” he thought, “and five thou­sand dol­lars will seem a big price for the farm. She can't help agree­ing to my terms.”

This con­sid­er­ation made him hope­ful, but for all that, he must wait, and wait­ing he found very tan­ta­liz­ing.

“Have you de­cid­ed to ac­cept my of­fer, Mr. Jack­son?”

“Waal, I'll have to take a lee­tle time to con­sid­er. How much did you say you'd give?”

“Forty thou­sand dol­lars.”

“I'd ought to have fifty.”

“Forty thou­sand dol­lars is a big sum of mon­ey.”

“And this farm is a per­fect gold mine. Shouldn't won­der if it would net a hun­dred thou­sand dol­lars.”

“There is no cer­tain­ty of that, and the pur­chasers will have to take a big risk”

“There isn't much risk. Ask any­body in Cen­ter­ville what he thinks of the Jack­son farm.”

“Sup­pose I were ready to come to your terms--mind, I don't say I am--would you sign the pa­pers to-​day?”

Jack­son looked per­plexed. He knew could not do it.

“What's your hur­ry?” he said.

“The cap­ital­ists whom I rep­re­sent are anx­ious to get to work as soon as pos­si­ble. That's nat­ural, isn't, it?”

“Ye-​es,” an­swered Jack­son.

“So, the soon­er we fix mat­ters the bet­ter. I want to go back to New York to-​mor­row if I can.”

“I don't think I can give my an­swer as soon as that. Wait a minute, though.”

A boy was ap­proach­ing, Jack­son's son, if one could judge from the re­sem­blance, hold­ing a let­ter in his hand.

“Come right here, Ab­ner,” he called out ea­ger­ly.

Ab­ner ap­proached, and his fa­ther snatched the let­ter from his hand. It bore the New York post­mark, but, on open­ing it, Jack­son looked bit­ter­ly dis­ap­point­ed. He had hoped it was from Mrs. Hamil­ton, ac­cept­ing his of­fer for the farm; but, in­stead of that, it was an unim­por­tant cir­cu­lar.

“I'll have to take time to think over your of­fer, Mr. Tay­lor,” he said. “You see, I'll have to talk over mat­ters with the old wom­an.”

“By the way,” said Tay­lor care­less­ly, “I was told in the vil­lage that you didn't own the farm--that it was owned by a la­dy in New York.”

“She used to own it,” said the fan­ner, un­easi­ly; “but I bought it of her a year ago.”

“So that you have the right to sell it?”

“Of course I have.”

“What have you to say to that, Ben?” asked Tay­lor qui­et­ly.

“That if Mrs. Hamil­ton has sold the farm to Mr. Jack­son she doesn't know it.”

“What do you mean, boy?” gasped Jack­son.

“I mean that when I left New York Mrs. Hamil­ton owned the farm.”

“It's a lie!” mut­tered the farmer; but he spoke with dif­fi­cul­ty. “I bought it a year ago.”

“In that case it is strange that you should have writ­ten a week ago of­fer­ing five thou­sand dol­lars for the farm.”

“Who says I wrote?”

“I do; and I have your let­ter in my pock­et,” an­swered Ben firm­ly.