It kept the big estates together; but my! it was hard on the
younger sons, and no one seemed even to think about the daughters. I
never heard them mentioned.

Now there was a very rich man; he had only two sons, and each of them
married, and had one son. The younger son died, and sent his boy for
his elder brother to take care of. He pretended to be good, but for
sure, he was bad as ever he could be. He knew that if his cousin were
out of the way, all that land and money would be his when his uncle
died. So he went to work and he tried for years, and a lawyer man who
had no conscience at all, helped him. At last when they had done
everything they could think of, they took a lot of money and put it in
the pocket of the son they wanted to ruin; then when his father missed
the money, and the house was filled with policemen, detectives, and
neighbours, the bad man said he'd feel more comfortable to have the
family searched too, merely as a formality, so he stepped out and was
gone over, and when the son's turn came, there was the money on him!
That made him a public disgrace to his family, and a criminal who
couldn't inherit the estate, and his father went raving mad and tried
to kill him, so he had to run away. At first he didn't care what he
did, so he came over here. Robert said that man was his best friend,
and as men went, he was a decent fellow, so he cheered him up all he
could, and went to work with all his might to prove he was innocent,
and to get back his family, and his money for him.

When Robert had enough evidence that he was almost ready to start to
England, his man got a cable from an old friend of his father's, who
always had believed in him, and it said that the bad man was dying--to
come quick. So Robert went all of a sudden, like the Dead Letters told
about. Now, he described how he reached there, took the old friend of
the father of his friend with him, and other witnesses, and all the
evidence he had, and went to see the sick man. When Robert showed him
what he could prove, the bad man said it was no use, he had to die in a
few days, so he might as well go with a clean conscience, and he told
about everything he had done. Robert had it all written out, signed
and sworn to. He told about all of it, and then he said to father:
"Have I made it clear to you?"

Leon was so excited he forgot all the manners he ever had, for he
popped up before father could open his head, and cried: "Clear a