cious of his infelicitous expression, added hastily, "I have really
been very much interested."

"Oh, no," was the reply, "you hain't _betrayed_ none, but I know old
fellers like me gen'rally tell a thing twice over while they're at it.
Wa'al," he went on, "it was like this. After Charley Cullom got to be
some grown he helped to keep the pot a-bilin', 'n they got on some
better. 'Bout seven year ago, though, he up an' got married, an' then
the fat ketched fire. Finally he allowed that if he had some money he'd
go West 'n take up some land, 'n git along like pussly 'n a flower
gard'n. He ambitioned that if his mother 'd raise a thousan' dollars on
her place he'd be sure to take care of the int'rist, an' prob'ly pay off
the princ'pal in almost no time. Wa'al, she done it, an' off he went.
She didn't come to me fer the money, because--I dunno--at any rate she
didn't, but got it of 'Zeke Swinney.

"Wa'al, it turned out jest 's any fool might 've predilictid, fer after
the first year, when I reckon he paid it out of the thousan', Charley
never paid no int'rist. The second year he was jes' gettin' goin', an'
the next year he lost a hoss jest 's he was cal'latin' to pay, an' the
next year the grasshoppers smote him, 'n so on; an' the outcome was that
at the end of five years, when the morgige had one year to run,
Charley'd paid one year, an' she'd paid one, an' she stood to owe three
years' int'rist. How old Swinney come to hold off so was that she used
to pay the cuss ten dollars or so ev'ry six months 'n git no credit fer
it, an' no receipt an' no witniss, 'n he knowed the prop'ty was
improving all the time. He may have had another reason, but at any rate
he let her run, an' got the shave reg'lar. But at the time I'm tellin'
you about he'd begun to cut up, an' allowed that if she didn't settle up
the int'rist he'd foreclose, an' I got wind on't an' I run across her
one day an' got to talkin' with her, an' she gin me the hull narration.
'How much do you owe the old critter?' I says. 'A hunderd an' eighty
dollars,' she says, 'an' where I'm goin' to git it,' she says, 'the Lord
only knows.' 'An' He won't tell ye, I reckon,' I says. Wa'al, of course
I'd known that old Swinney had a morgidge because it was a matter of
record, an' I knowed him well enough to give a guess what his game was
goin' to be, an' more'n that I'd had my eye on that piece an' parcel an'
I figured that he wa'n't any likelier a citizen 'n I was." ("Yes," said