"Sensitive? No. I can get along without Edgar Talbot's notice. I mean some time to stand as high or higher than Uncle Solon, and to be quite as rich."

"I hope you will, Mark, but as we are at present situated it will be hard to rise."

"Plenty of poor boys have risen, and why not I?"

"It is natural for the young to be hopeful, but I have had a good deal to depress me. Did you remember that the rent comes due the day after to-morrow?"

"How much have you towards it, mother?"

"Only five dollars, and it's eight. I don't see where the other three dollars are coming from, unless," – and here her glance rested on the plain gold ring on her finger.

"Pledge your wedding-ring, mother!" exclaimed Mark. "Surely you don't mean that?"

"I would rather do it than lose our shelter, poor as it is."

"There must be some other way – there must be."

"You will not receive any wages till Saturday."

"No, but perhaps we can borrow something till then. There's Mrs. Mack up-stairs. She has plenty of money, though she lives in a poor way."

"There isn't much hope there, Mark. She feels poorer than I do, though I am told she has five thousand dollars out at interest."

"Never mind. I am going to try her."

"Eat your supper first."

"So I will. I shall need all the strength I can get from a good meal to confront her."

Half an hour later Mark went up-stairs and tapped at the door of the rooms above his mother's.

"Come in!" said a feeble quavering voice.

Mark opened the door and entered. In a rocking chair sat, or rather crouched, a little old woman, her face seamed and wrinkled. She had taken a comforter from the bed and wrapped it around her to keep her warm, for it was a chilly day, and there was no fire in her little stove.

"Good evening, Mrs. Mack," said Mark. "How do you feel?"

"It's a cold day," groaned the old lady. "I – I feel very uncomfortable."

"Why don't you have a fire then?"

"It's gone out, and it's so late it isn't worth while to light it again."

"But it is worth while to be comfortable," insisted Mark.

"I – I can keep warm with this comforter around me, and – fuel is high, very high."

"But you can afford to buy more when this is burned."

"No, Mark. I have to be economical – very economical. I don't want to spend all my money, and go to the poor-house."

"I don't think there's much danger of that. You've got money in the savings bank, haven't you?"

"Yes – a little, but I can't earn anything. I'm too old to work, for I am seventy-seven, and I might live years longer, you know."

"Don't you get interest on your money?"

"Yes, a little, but it costs a good deal to live."

"Well, if the interest isn't enough, you can use some of the principal. I can put you in the way of earning twenty-five cents."

"Can you?" asked the old woman eagerly. "How?"

"If you'll lend me three dollars till Saturday – I get my wages then – I'll pay you twenty-five cents for the accommodation."

"But you might not pay me," said the old woman cautiously, "and it would kill me to lose three dollars."

Mark wanted to laugh, but felt that it would not do.

"There isn't any danger," he said. "I get two weeks' pay on Saturday. It will be as much as nine dollars, so you see you are sure of getting back your money."

"I – I don't know. I am afraid."

"What are you afraid of?"

"You might get run over by the horse cars, or a truck, and then you couldn't get your money."

"I will be careful for your sake, Mrs. Mack," said Mark good-humoredly. "You'll get your money back, and twenty-five cents more."

The old woman's face was a study – between avarice on the one hand and timidity on the other.

"I – I'm afraid," she said.

She rocked to and fro in her chair in her mental perturbation, and Mark saw that his errand was a failure.

"If you change your mind, let me know," he said.

As he reached the foot of the stairs he was treated to a surprise. There, just in front of his mother's door stood Solon Talbot and Edgar.

CHAPTER III
AN UNEXPECTED CALL

"In what room does your mother live?" asked Solon Talbot.

"This is our home," said Mark, proceeding to open the door.

Edgar Talbot sniffed contemptuously.

"I don't see how you can live in such a mean place," he remarked.

"It is not a matter of choice," returned Mark gravely. "We have to live in a cheap tenement."

By this time the door was opened.

"Mother," said Mark, preceding the two visitors, "here are Uncle Solon and Edgar come to call on you."

Mrs. Mason's pale cheek flushed, partly with mortification at her humble surroundings, for when she first knew Solon Talbot he was only a clerk, as she had said, and she was a society belle.

There was another feeling also. She had a strong suspicion that her brother-in-law had defrauded her of her share in her father's estate.

"I am glad to see you, Mr. Talbot," she said, extending her hand. "And this is Edgar! How you have grown, Edgar."

"Yes, ma'am," responded Edgar stiffly.

Both Mrs. Mason and Mark noticed that he did not call her "aunt." Her nephew's coldness chilled her.

"I am sorry to see you in such a poor place," she said, smiling faintly.

"I suppose rents are high in New York," said Solon Talbot awkwardly.

"Yes, and our means are small. How is my sister Mary?"

"Quite well, thank you."

"Did she send me any message?"

"She did not know I was going to call."

"How long it seems since I saw her!" sighed Mrs. Mason.

"I suppose you heard that I was in town."

"Yes; Mark told me."

"I was not sure whether I could call, as I am here on a hurried business errand."

"I am glad you have called. I wished to ask you about father's estate."

"Just so! It is very surprising – I assure you that it amazed me very much – to find that he left so little."

"I can't understand it at all, Solon. Only a year before he died he told me that he considered himself worth fifteen thousand dollars."

"People are often deluded as to the amount of their possessions. I have known many such cases."

"But I have only received seventy-five dollars, and there were two heirs – Mary and myself. According to that father must have left only one hundred and fifty dollars."

"Of course he left more, but there were debts – and funeral expenses and doctor's bills."

"I understand that, but it seems so little."

"It was very little, and I felt sorry, not only on your account, but on Mary's. Of course, as my wife, she will be provided for, but it would have been comfortable for her to inherit a fair sum."

"You can imagine what it is to me who am not amply provided for. I thought there might be five thousand dollars coming to me."

Solon Talbot shook his head.

"That anticipation was very extravagant!" he said.

"It was founded on what father told me."

"True; but I think your father's mind was weakened towards the end of his life. He was not really responsible for what he said."

"I disagree with you there, Solon. Father seemed to me in full possession of his faculties to the last."

"You viewed him through the eyes of filial affection, but I was less likely to be influenced in my judgments."

"Five thousand dollars would have made me so happy. We are miserably poor, and Mark has to work so hard to support us in this poor way."

"I thought telegraph boys earned quite a snug income," said Solon Talbot, who looked uncomfortable.

He was dreading every moment that his sister-in-law would ask him for pecuniary assistance. He did not understand her independent nature. Her brother-in-law was about the last man to whom she would have stooped to beg a favor.

"Mark sometimes makes as high as five dollars a week," said Mrs. Mason in a tone of mild sarcasm.

"I am sure that is very good pay for a boy of his age."

"It is a small sum for a family of three persons to live upon, Solon."

"Um, ah! I thought perhaps you might earn something else."

"Sometimes I earn as high as a dollar and a half a week making shirts."

Mr. Talbot thought it best to drop the subject.

"I am deeply sorry for you," he said. "It is a pity your husband didn't insure his life. He might have left you in comfort."

"He did make application for insurance, but his lungs were already diseased, and the application was refused."

"I may be able to help you – in a small way, of course," proceeded Solon Talbot.

Mark looked up in surprise. Was it possible that his close-fisted uncle was offering to assist them.

Mrs. Mason did not answer, but waited for developments.

"I have already paid you seventy-five dollars from your father's estate," resumed Mr. Talbot. "Strictly speaking, it is all you are entitled to. But I feel for your position, and – and your natural disappointment, and I feel prompted to make it a hundred dollars by paying you twenty-five dollars more. I have drafted a simple receipt here, which I will get you to sign, and then I will hand you the money."

He drew from his wallet a narrow slip of paper, on which was written this form:

"Received from Solon Talbot the sum of One Hundred Dollars, being the full amount due me from the estate of my late father, Elisha Doane, of which he is the administrator."

Mr. Talbot placed the paper on the table, and pointing to a black line below the writing, said, "Sign here."

"Let me see the paper, mother," said Mark.

He read it carefully.

"I advise you not to sign it," he added, looking up.

"What do you mean?" exclaimed Solon Talbot angrily.

"I mean," returned Mark firmly, "that mother has no means of knowing that a hundred dollars is all that she is entitled to from grandfather's estate."

"Didn't I tell you it was?" demanded Talbot frowning.

"Uncle Solon," said Mark calmly, "I am only a boy, but I know that one can't be too careful in business matters."

"Do you dare to doubt my father's word?" blustered Edgar.

"Our business is with your father, not with you," said Mark.

"What is it you want?" asked Solon Talbot irritably.

"I want, or rather mother does, to see a detailed statement of grandfather's property, and the items of his debts and expenses."

Solon Talbot was quite taken aback by Mark's demand. He had supposed the boy knew nothing of business.

"Really," he said, "this impertinence from my own nephew is something I was by no means prepared for. It is a poor return for my liberal offer."

"Your liberal offer?"

"Yes, the twenty-five dollars I offered your mother is out of my own pocket – offered solely out of consideration for her poverty. Do I understand," he asked, addressing his sister-in-law, "that you decline my offer?"

Mrs. Mason looked doubtfully at Mark. Twenty-five dollars in their present circumstances would be a boon, and, in addition to Mark's earnings, would tide them over at least three months. Was it right, or wise, to decline it?

Mark's face showed no signs of wavering. He was calm and resolute.

"What do you think, Mark?" asked his mother.

"You know what I think, mother. We have no knowledge that the estate has been fairly administered, and you would be bartering away our rights."

"I think I won't sign the receipt, Solon," said Mrs. Mason.

Solon Talbot looked very angry.

"Then," he replied, "I cannot give you the twenty-five dollars. Edgar, we will go."

"Give my love to Mary," faltered Mrs. Mason.

Solon Talbot deigned no answer, but strode from the room with an angry look.

"Mother, I am convinced that Uncle Solon was trying to swindle us," said Mark.

"I hope we have done right, Mark," rejoined his mother doubtfully.

"What is this, mother?" asked Mark, as he picked up from the floor a letter partially torn.

"It must have been dropped by Solon Talbot."