CHAPTER XXXVI. THE TARBOX FAMILY.

After Grant’s departure his mother felt very lonely. She found very little satisfaction in the company of her husband, who became more miserly as he grew older. He began also to show signs of breaking health, and this did not escape the vigilant eyes of his daughter, Mrs. Sophia Bartlett, and her husband. They were not at all insensible to the fact that their father’s property was a snug one, and that it would make them very comfortable when added to their own.

Sophia Bartlett began to feel suspicious that her father’s second wife would attempt, by undue influence, to obtain more than her share of the estate. At least once a week she was accustomed to drive over with her son Rodney, when her husband was occupied by business, and learn all she could of what was going on at the Tarbox farm.

304Rodney generally inquired after Grant, but not from friendly motives.

Some months after Grant’s departure one of these visits was in progress.

“Have you heard from Grant, Mrs. Tarbox?” he asked, for it was in this way he always addressed his grandfather’s wife.

“I heard last week,” answered Grant’s mother.

“How is he getting along?”

“He had just arrived in California. The journey across the plains is a long and tedious one.”

“Did he have anything to do?”

“He was expecting work.”

“Probably he won’t get any,” said Seth Tarbox. “The boy made a fool of himself when he left home. He might have had a good livin’ here, but he was sot on trampin’ to California.”

“That’s the way I feel,” said Sophia Bartlett. “Young folks don’t know what is best for themselves. As likely as not the boy will be sending home for money to get back.”

“He won’t get none from me,” muttered Mr. 305Tarbox emphatically, “and I want that understood.”

“He isn’t very likely to send to you, Mr. Tarbox,” said his wife, indignant at this attack upon Grant.

“I dunno about that. He’s a headstrong boy, and always was.”

“I am glad that my son Rodney is a good and dutiful boy, and is willing to be guided by my advice and his grandfather’s.”

Rodney understood that it was well to keep in the good graces of his grandfather, who might remember him handsomely in his will, and tried to look virtuous and meek.

“Yes,” he said, “grandfather knows what is best for me.”

“Rodney’s case is very different,” Mrs. Tarbox could not help saying. “His future is provided for, Grant had nothing to look forward to here except the life of a farm laborer.”

“Is he too proud to work on a farm?” sneered Mrs. Bartlett.

“No more than your son Rodney,” calmly replied Mrs. Tarbox.

“I’ve got something better to do than to 306work on a farm,” said Rodney, in a lofty tone. “Just fancy me in overalls, ma!”

“To be sure!” chimed in his mother.

“It aint no disgrace to wear overalls,” said Seth Tarbox, who did not aspire to be thought genteel, like his daughter and Rodney.

“Of course not, pa!” said Mrs. Bartlett, in a conciliatory tone. “You are a substantial farmer, and find it necessary to superintend your own work.”

“I hope Rodney aint got no foolish notions about bein’ too high-toned for honest work.”

“No, pa; but Rodney isn’t rugged, and his father and myself mean to make a lawyer of him.”

“Humph! Some lawyers aint worth their salt.”

“That’s the case with some farmers, too, isn’t it?” returned his daughter.

“I own you’re right, Sophia. Why, there’s Bill Jones is gettin’ poorer and poorer every year. I’ve got a thousand-dollar mortgage on his farm,” he chuckled, “and I guess I’ll have to foreclose sooner or later.”

“What will become of Mrs. Jones and her 307young children?” asked Mrs. Tarbox, in a tone of pity.

“That aint my lookout,” said Seth Tarbox, in a hard tone.

“But surely you wouldn’t turn the poor woman out into the street.”

“It aint for me to look out for another man’s wife and children, Mrs. T.,” returned the farmer.

“But the farm must be worth a good deal more than the amount of your mortgage!”

“Yes,” chuckled the farmer, “it’s well worth three thousand dollars. So much the better for me!”

“You wouldn’t take possession of it, and take such an advantage of the family!”

“Mrs. T., you don’t understand business. When you talk in that way you only make yourself ridiculous. You’d better leave me to attend to business, and you look after the housekeeping,” and he turned to his daughter for approval.

“You are right, pa,” said Sophia, “and Mrs. Tarbox, though she means well, shows that she doesn’t understand business.”

308Mrs. Tarbox bit her lip, but did not reply. She had made the discovery long since that the daughter was as cold and selfish as the father, and probably even more so.

“Mrs. Tarbox, have you got Grant’s last letter?” asked Rodney.

“Yes.”

“Would you mind letting me read it?”

Mrs. Tarbox hesitated a moment, and then replied: “A part of it is private, but I will read you the part in which he speaks of his position and prospects.”

“Thank you. I would like to hear it.”

Mrs. Tarbox took from her pocket a letter which she had perused half a dozen times already, and read as follows:

“Well, mother, I have at last reached California. It is a long and tiresome journey across the plains. I hope, when I go back, I shall be able to go by steamer to New York. However, I made some pleasant friends on the way, and I have good courage, though my money is nearly out.”

“Humph!” interrupted Seth Tarbox; “just as I expected.”

“Grant didn’t take a fortune with him,” said his mother. “How could you expect he 309would have much money left when he reached the end of his journey?”

“I didn’t, Mrs. T. That is what I said. Read on.”

“I haven’t decided yet what I will do first. I expect sometime to go to the gold fields, but I may get a position first and earn some money to buy my outfit. I am well and strong, and I am sure I can make a living some way.”

“Mark my words,” said Sophia Bartlett, “the time will come when your son will wish he had never left the farm.”

“I don’t feel sure of that,” said Mrs. Tarbox. “Grant is a manly boy, and he can work in California just as well as here, and will be paid better than here.”

“Do you mean to say that I didn’t pay the boy enough for his work, Mrs. T.?”

“I will express no opinion on that subject. California is a new country, where labor is naturally more highly compensated than here.”

“I am glad I am not in Grant’s place,” said Rodney.

“So am I,” added his mother; “but you always had good judgment, Rodney.”

310“I hope so. When I am a man I may go to California, just to see the country, but I prefer to stay at home now.”

“He has an old head on young shoulders,” said his mother complacently.

“It’s my birthday to-morrow, grandpa,” observed Rodney significantly.

“Is it?” asked Seth Tarbox. “How old are you?”

“Sixteen.”

“Well, well, I didn’t know you were getting on so fast. There’s a quarter for a birthday present.”

Rodney accepted the coin, but turned up his nose at his grandfather’s niggardliness, and expressed himself freely on the subject to his mother on the way home.

“What a mean old skinflint grandfather is!” he exclaimed. “Twenty-five cents, and he a rich man!”

“Hush, Rodney, don’t let any one hear you speak in that way!”

“But he is mean! you can’t deny it!”

“He is close,” said Mrs. Bartlett cautiously. 311“Most farmers are, I believe; but just wait patiently, and the money which he has saved by his economy will come to us. You must seem grateful, or he may take a notion to leave his property to Mrs. Tarbox and Grant.”

“Oh, I’ll be careful, ma, never fear! I hope Grant Colburn won’t get a cent.”

“I don’t think he will. In fact, I feel sure of it.”

“Do you think Mrs. Tarbox will get much?”

“Not if I can prevent it!” said his mother, closing her lips firmly.

“I expect she only married the old man for his money.”

“I suppose she wanted a home for herself and Grant.”

“Will the law give her anything?”

“Yes; but I’ve thought of a way to get over that.”

“What is it, ma?”

“If I can induce your grandfather to make a deed of gift to me of his property before 312he dies, on condition of my supporting him the rest of his life, that will evade the law.”

“That will be a good idea. I shouldn’t wonder if Grant and his mother had to go to the poorhouse at last. He’d come down off his high horse then.”

“I hope not. Mrs. Tarbox can get employment as a housekeeper probably, and Grant ought to be able to support himself. Of course they must look out for themselves.”

Not long afterward, unfortunately for Mrs. Tarbox, her husband lost fifty dollars. He had sold a horse to a man in a neighboring town for an excessive price, and fifty dollars remained due on the purchase money. This the purchaser refused to pay, and as his property was all in his wife’s name, Seth Tarbox was unable to collect it, although, as may be imagined, he moved heaven and earth to accomplish it.

This made him feel very poor, and he determined to make it up by retrenchment in his personal expenses. Had the economy fallen upon himself he might have been justified, but 313as it occurred to him that by dismissing the woman who helped his wife on washing day he could save seventy-five cents a week, he was mean enough to make this proposal.

Mrs. Tarbox could hardly believe him in earnest, for she saw only too clearly at what he was aiming.