The Store Boy

CHAPTER III MRS. BARCLAY'S CALLERS

About half-​past eight o'clock Mrs. Bar­clay sat with her work in her hand. Her headache was bet­ter, but she did not re­gret not hav­ing ac­com­pa­nied Ben to the Town Hall.

“I am glad Ben is en­joy­ing him­self,” she thought, “but I would rather stay qui­et­ly at home. Poor boy! he works hard enough, and needs recre­ation now and then.”

Just then a knock was heard at the out­side door.

“I won­der who it can be?” thought the wid­ow. “I sup­posed ev­ery­body would be at the Town Hall. It may be Mrs. Perkins come to bor­row some­thing.”

Mrs. Perkins was a neigh­bor much ad­dict­ed to bor­row­ing, which was rather dis­agree­able, but might have been more eas­ily tol­er­at­ed but that she sel­dom re­turned the ar­ti­cles lent.

Mrs. Bar­clay went to the door and opened it, ful­ly ex­pect­ing to see her bor­row­ing neigh­bor. A very dif­fer­ent per­son met her view. The ragged hat, the ill-​look­ing face, the ne­glect­ed at­tire, led her to rec­og­nize the tramp whom Ben had de­scribed to her as hav­ing at­tempt­ed to rob him in the af­ter­noon. Ter­ri­fied, Mrs. Bar­clay's first im­pulse was to shut the door and bolt it. But her un­wel­come vis­itor was too quick for her. Thrust­ing his foot in­to the door­way, he in­ter­posed an ef­fec­tu­al ob­sta­cle in the way of shut­ting the door.

“No, you don't, ma'am!” he said, with as laugh. “I un­der­stand your lit­tle game. You want to shut me out.”

“What do you want?” asked the wid­ow ap­pre­hen­sive­ly.

“What do I want?” re­turned the tramp. “Well, to be­gin with, I want some­thing to eat--and drink,” he added, af­ter a pause.

“Why don't you go to the tav­ern?” asked Mrs. Bar­clay, anx­ious for him to de­part.

“Well, I can't af­ford it. All the mon­ey I've got is a bo­gus dol­lar your rogue of a son gave me this af­ter­noon.”

“You stole it from him,” said the wid­ow in­dig­nant­ly.

“What's the odds if I did. It ain't of no val­ue. Come, haven't you any­thing to eat in the house? I'm hun­gry as a wolf.”

“And you look like one!” thought Mrs. Bar­clay, glanc­ing at his unattrac­tive fea­tures; but she did not dare to say it.

There seemed no way of re­fus­ing, and she was glad to com­ply with his re­quest, if by so do­ing she could soon get rid of him.

“Stay here,” she said, “and I'll bring you some bread and but­ter and cold meat.”

“Thank you, I'd rather come in,” said the tramp, and he pushed his way through the part­ly open door.

She led the way un­easi­ly in­to the kitchen just in the rear of the sit­ting room where she had been seat­ed.

“I wish Ben was here,” she said to her­self, with sink­ing heart.

The tramp seat­ed him­self at the kitchen ta­ble, while Mrs. Bar­clay, go­ing to the pantry, brought out part of a loaf of bread, and but­ter, and a few slices of cold beef, which she set be­fore him. With­out cer­emo­ny he at­tacked the viands and ate as if half fam­ished. When about half through, he turned to the wid­ow, and asked:

“Haven't you some whisky in the house?”

“I nev­er keep any,” an­swered Mrs. Bar­clay.

“Rum or gin, then?” I ain't par­tic'lar. I want some­thing to warm me up."

“I keep no liquor of any kind. I don't ap­prove of drink, or want Ben to touch it.”

“Oh, you be­long to the cold wa­ter army, do you?” said the tramp with a sneer. “Give me some cof­fee, then.”

“I have no fire, and can­not pre­pare any.”

“What have you got, then?” de­mand­ed than un­wel­come guest im­pa­tient­ly.

“I can give you a glass of ex­cel­lent well wa­ter.”

“[il­leg­ible] Do you want to choke me?” re­turned the tramp in dis­gust.

“Sup­pose I mix you some mo­lasses and wa­ter,” sug­gest­ed the wid­ow, anx­ious to pro­pi­ti­ate her dan­ger­ous guest.

“Humph! Well, that will do, if you've got noth­ing bet­ter. Be quick about it, for my throat is parched.”

As soon as pos­si­ble the drink was pre­pared and set be­side his plate. He drained it at a draught, and called for a sec­ond glass, which was sup­plied him. Present­ly, for all things must have an end, the tramp's ap­petite seemed to be sat­is­fied. He threw him­self back in his chair, stretched his legs, and, with his hands in his pock­ets, fixed his eyes on the wid­ow.

“I feel bet­ter,” he said.

“I am glad to hear it,” said Mrs. Bar­clay. “Now, if you'll be kind enough, leave the house, for I ex­pect Ben back be­fore long.”

“And you don't want him to get hurt,” laughed the tramp. “Well, I do owe him a flog­ging for a trick he played on me.”

“Oh, pray, go away!” said Mrs. Bar­clay, ap­pre­hen­sive­ly. “I have giv­en you some sup­per, and that ought to sat­is­fy you.”

“I can't go away till I've talked to you a lit­tle on busi­ness.”

“Busi­ness! What busi­ness can you have with me?”

“More than you think. You are the wid­ow of John Bar­clay, ain't you?”

“Yes; did you know my hus­band?”

“Yes; that is, I saw some­thing of him just be­fore he died.”

“Can you tell me any­thing about his last mo­ments?” asked the wid­ow, for­get­ting the char­ac­ter of her vis­itor, and on­ly think­ing of her hus­band.

“No, that isn't in my line. I ain't a doc­tor nor yet a min­is­ter. I say, did he leave any mon­ey?”

“Not that we have been able to find out. He owned this hone, but left no oth­er prop­er­ty.”

“That you know of,” said the tramp, sig­nif­icant­ly.

“Do you know of any?” asked Mrs. Bar­clay ea­ger­ly. “How did you hap­pen to know him?”

“I was the bar­keep­er in the ho­tel where he died. It was a small house, not one of your first-​class ho­tels.”

“My hus­band was al­ways care­ful of his ex­pens­es. He did not spend mon­ey un­nec­es­sar­ily. With his pru­dence we all thought he must have some in­vest­ments, but we could dis­cov­er none.”

“Have you got any mon­ey in the house?” asked the tramp, with seem­ing abrupt­ness.

“Why do you ask?” re­turned the wid­ow, alarmed. “Sure­ly, you would not rob me?”

“No, I don't want to rob you. I want to sell you some­thing.”

“I don't care to buy. It takes all our mon­ey for nec­es­sary ex­pens­es.”

“You don't ask what I have to sell.”

“No, be­cause I can­not buy it, what­ev­er it may be.”

“It is--a se­cret,” said the tramp.

“A se­cret!” re­peat­ed Mrs. Bar­clay, be­wil­dered.

“Yes, and a se­cret worth buy­ing. Your hus­band wasn't so poor as you think. He left stock and pa­pers rep­re­sent­ing three thou­sand dol­lars, and I am the on­ly man who can put you in the way of get­ting it.”

Mrs. Bar­clay was about to ex­press her sur­prise, when a loud knock was head at the out­er door.

“Who's that?” de­mand­ed the tramp quick­ly. “Is it the boy?”

“No, he would not knock.”

“Then, let me get out of this,” he said, leap­ing to his feet. “Isn't there a back door?”

“Yes, there it is.”

He hur­ried to the door, un­bolt­ed it, and made his es­cape in­to the open be­yond the house, just as the knock was re­peat­ed.

Con­fused by what she had heard, and the strange con­duct of her vis­itor, the wid­ow took the lamp and went to the door. To her sur­prise she found on open­ing it, two vis­itors, in one of whom she rec­og­nized Squire Dav­en­port, al­ready re­ferred to as hold­ing a mort­gage on her house. The oth­er was a short, dark-​com­plex­ioned man, who looked like a me­chan­ic.

“Ex­cuse me the late­ness of my call, Mrs. Bar­clay,” said the squire smooth­ly. “I come on im­por­tant busi­ness. This is Mr. Kirk, a cousin of my wife.”

“Walk in, gen­tle­men,” said Mrs. Bar­clay.

“This is night of sur­pris­es,” she thought to her­self.