meant to adopt her then! An alien was to inherit
the Champney property! Octavius actually shivered at the thought.

Was it, could it be an act of spite against Aurora Googe? Was it a final
answer to any expectations of her nephew, Champney Googe, her husband's
namesake and favorite? Was this little alien waif to be made a catspaw
for her revenge? She was capable of such a thing, was Almeda Champney.
_He_ knew her; none better! Had not her will, thus far in her life, bent
everything with which it had come in contact; crushed whatever had
opposed it; broken irrevocably whosoever for a while had successfully
resisted it?

His thin lips drew to a straight line. All his manhood's strength of
desire for fair play, a desire he had been fated to see unfulfilled
during the last twenty years, rose in rebellion to champion the cause of
the little newcomer who smiled on him so brightly in the office of The
Greenbush. Nor did he falter in his resolution when he presented himself
at the library door with the telegram in his hand.

"Come in, Octavius; was there any mail?"

"Only a telegram from New York." He handed it to her.

She opened and read it; then laid it on the table. She removed her
eyeglasses, for she had grown far-sighted with advancing years, in order
to look at the back of the small man who was leaving the room. If he had
seen the smile that accompanied the action, he might well have faltered
in his resolution to champion any righteous cause on earth.

"Wait a moment, Octavius."

"Now it's coming!" he thought and faced her again; he was bracing
himself mentally to meet the announcement.

"Did you see the junk man at The Corners to-day about those shingle
nails?"

In the second of hesitation before replying, he had time inwardly to
curse her. She was always letting him down in this way. It was a trick
of hers when, to use his own expression, she had "something up her
sleeve."

"Yes; but he won't take them off our hands."

"Why not?" She spoke sharply as was her way when she suspected any
thwarting of her will or desire.

"He says he won't give you your price for they ain't worth it. They
ain't particular good for old iron anyway; most on 'em's rusty and
crooked. You know they've been on the old coach house for good thirty
years, and the Judge used to say--"

"What will he give?"

"A quarter of a cent a pound."

"How many pounds are there?"

"Fifty-two."

"Fifty-two--hm-m; he sha'n't have them. They'