Roxy Hastings — page 27: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

18 * ROXY HASTINGS. in his last illness he had given his son a deed to obviate the trouble and expense of making and proving a will, or taking out letters of administration. “Tt’s all I have to leave,” said the dying man, “except the little that I have already given to your mother, brother, and sister. Itis worth nothing, or nearly nothing now, but it may possibly have some value hereafter. Probably you might get a hundred dollars for it, and if you should be hard pressed it would be better to take that than to keep it and pay taxes on it.” A hundred dollars. Charles thought so, too, as he re- called these words. He wished most earnestly that he could realize that magnificent sum for his unmarketable estate, and he resolved, after much deliberation, to go and see it, and try to find a purchaser for it. He was unoccu- pied, therefore he would waste no valuable time, and as to traveling expenses, why he would, if necessary, go on foot; and wouldn’t he astonish and delight his friends when he came back with a pocket full of money, perhaps even twice the sum which he had fixed upon as his mini- mum price? It would last for several months, and surely, before it was all gone, Charley thought, he would find something to do which would keep the wolf from the door, and secure to them the simple privilege of existence. “Grandfather shall have a week’s holiday,” he said, cal- culating, like the luckless milk-maid, “and when I get a place he shall give up that dreadful work altogether.” Having decided to go he next resolved to keep his busi- ness quite secret from the family, hoping to surprise them with good news, or at all events to save them from hopes which might be blasted. Assured that they possessed the means for present sup- port, Charles left them professedly for a week, obtaining with some difficulty his mother’s permission to go, and to keep his secret, whatever it might be. “ He is pining here,” she said to Laura, and perhaps he has found some place out of town which he is to take on trial. He is old enough, and discreet enough, to be trusted, and he has promised to be most careful of himself. Let him go.” Young Lee was a good pedestrian, but he did not travel to his patrimony altogether on foot. He had a few dollars more than was necessary to pay for his food and lodgings by the way, and he was astonished to find how far he could make them go, and how far they could make him go, by availing himself of only the cheapest modes of travel. . Eomicbooks.co