“Yes,” added Jane, gazing at her father greedily and vindictively, “tryin’ tuh git it all fer hisself! An’ us a-workin’ hyur year in an’ year out on this hyur ol’ place tuh keep him comfortable!” She was no less hard in her glances than her brother. Her father seemed little less than a thief, attempting to rob them of the hard-earned fruit of their toil.
As the lawyer took the paper from Dode and spread it upon the old board table and handed Queeder a pen the latter took it aimlessly, quite as a child might have, andmade his mark where indicated, Mr. Giles observing very cautiously, “This is of your own free will and deed, is it, Mr. Queeder?” The old man made no reply. For the time being anyhow, possibly due to the blow on his head as he fell, he had lost the main current of his idea, which was not to sign. After signing he looked vaguely around, as though uncertain as to what else might be requested of him, while Mrs. Queeder made her mark, answering “yes” to the same shrewd question. Then Dode, as the senior intelligence of this institution and the one who by right of force now dominated, having witnessed the marks of his father and mother, as did Jane, two signatures being necessary, he took the money and before the straining eyes of his relatives proceeded to recount it. Meanwhile old Queeder, still asleep to the significance of the money, sat quite still, but clawed at it as though it were something which he ought to want, but was not quite sure of it.
“You find it all right, I suppose?” asked the lawyer, who was turning to go. Dode acknowledged that it was quite correct.
Then the two visitors, possessed of the desired deed, departed. The family, barring the father, who sat there still in a daze, began to discuss how the remarkable sum was to be divided.
“Now, I just wanta tell yuh one thing, Dode,” urged the mother, all avarice and anxiety for herself, “a third o’ that, whutever ’tis, b’longs tuh me, accordin’ tuh law!”
“An’ I sartinly oughta git a part o’ that thar, workin’ the way I have,” insisted Jane, standing closely over Dode.
“Well, just keep yer hands off till I git through, cantcha?” asked Dode, beginning for the third time to count it. The mere feel of it was so entrancing! What doors would it not open? He could get married now, go to the city, do a hundred things he had always wanted to do. The fact that his father was entitled to anything or that, having lost his wits, he was now completely helpless, a pathetic figure and very likely from now on doomed to wander about aloneor to do his will, moved him not in the least. By right of strength and malehood he was now practically master here, or so he felt himself to be. As he fingered the money he glowed and talked, thinking wondrous things, then suddenly remembering the concealed eight hundred, or his father’s part of it, he added, “Yes, an’ whar’s that other eight hundred, I’d like tuh know? He’s a-carryin’ it aroun’ with him er hidin’ it hyurabout mebbe!” Then eyeing the crumpled victim suspiciously, he began to feel in the old man’s clothes, but, not finding anything, desisted, saying they might get it later. The money in his hands was finally divided: a third to Mrs. Queeder, a fourth to Jane, the balance to himself as the faithful heir and helper of his father, the while he speculated as to the whereabouts of the remaining eight hundred.
Just then Queeder, who up to this time had been completely bereft of his senses, now recovered sufficiently to guess nearly all of what had so recently transpired. With a bound he was on his feet, and, looking wildly about him, exclaiming as he did so in a thin, reedy voice, “They’ve stole my prupetty! They’ve stole my prupetty! I’ve been robbed, I have! I’ve been robbed! Eh! Eh! Eh! This hyur land ain’t wuth only eight thousan’—hit’s wuth twenty-five thousan’, an’ that’s whut I could ’a’ had for it, an’ they’ve gone an’ made me sign it all away! Eh! Eh! Eh!” He jigged and moaned, dancing helplessly about until, seeing Dode with his share of the money still held safely in his hand, his maniacal chagrin took a new form, and, seizing it and running to the open door, he began to throw a portion of the precious bills to the winds, crying as he did so, “They’ve stole my prupetty! They’ve stole my prupetty! I don’t want the consarned money—I don’t want it! I want my prupetty! Eh! Eh! Eh!”
In this astonishing situation Dode saw but one factor—the money. Knowing nothing of the second prospector’s offer, he could not realize what it was that so infuriated the old man and had finally completely upset his mind. As thelatter jigged and screamed and threw the money about he fell upon him with the energy of a wildcat and, having toppled him over and wrested the remainder of the cash from him, he held him safely down, the while he called to his sister and mother, “Pick up the money, cantcha? Pick up the money an’ git a rope, cantcha? Git a rope! Cantcha see he’s done gone plum daffy? He’s outen his head, I tell yuh. He’s crazy, he is, shore! Git a rope!” and eyeing the money now being assembled by his helpful relatives, he pressed the struggling maniac’s body to the floor. When the latter was safely tied and the money returned, the affectionate son arose and, having once more recounted his share in order to see that it was all there, he was content to look about him somewhat more kindly on an all too treacherous world. Then, seeing the old man where he was trussed like a fowl for market, he added, somewhat sympathetically, it may be:
“Well, who’d ’a’ thort! Pore ol’ Pap! I do b’lieve he’s outen his mind for shore this time! He’s clean gone—plum daffy.”
“Yes, that’s whut he is, I do b’lieve,” added Mrs. Queeder with a modicum of wifely interest, yet more concerned at that with her part of the money than anything else.
Then Dode, his mother and sister began most unconcernedly to speculate as to what if anything was next to be done with the old farmer, the while the latter rolled a vacant eye over a scene he was no longer able to interpret.