For a week or so I refused to talk with Rucker or Jackway; but sat around and tried to make up my mind what to do.  To hire Jackway would take all my savings; and the schedules which Rucker brought me on legal-cap paper I refused even to touch with my hands.  I am sure, now, that Rucker had sent Jackway to me in the first place, never suspecting that the matter of the estate had been so far from my mind; and thereby, by too much craft, he lost the opportunity of stealing it all.  Jackway kept telling me of Rucker’s rascalities, so as to get into my good graces and confidence, in which he succeeded better than he knew; and urging me to pay him a few dollars—­just a few dollars—­“to begin proceedings to stay waste and sequestration”; but I did not give him anything because it seemed a first step into something I had not understood.

4

I began calling on land agents, thinking I might use what little money I had left to make a first payment on a farm; but the land around Madison was too high in price for me.  Two or three of these real estate agents were also lawyers; and I caught Rucker and Jackway together, looking worried and anxious, when I came from the office of one of them who very kindly informed me that, if he were in my place, he would go across the Mississippi and settle in Iowa.  He had been as far west as Fort Dodge, and described to me the great prairies, unbroken by the plow, the railroads which were just ready to cross the Mississippi, the rich soil, the chance there was to get a home, and to become my own master.  I began to feel an interest in Iowa.

I think these days must have been anxious ones for Rucker, greedy as he was for my little fortune, ignorant as he was of the depth of the ignorance of the silent stupid boy with whom he was dealing—­and a boy, too, who had made that one remark about his way of living and traveling that seemed to show a knowledge of just what he was doing, and had done.  I could see after that, that he thought me much sharper than I was.  Lawyer Jackway haunted the hotel, and was spending more money—­Rucker’s money, I know.  He had bought a new overcoat, and was drinking a good deal more than was good for him; but he wormed out of me something about my desire for a farm, and after having had a chance to see Rucker he began talking of a compromise.

“The old swindler,” said he, “has all the evidence in his own hands; and he and that red-headed spiritual partner of his will swear to anything.  As your legal adviser,” said he, “and the legal adviser of your sainted mother, I’d advise you to take anything he is willing to give—­within bounds, of course, within bounds.”

So the next time Rucker sidled into the tavern, and began beslavering me about the way the money left by my mother was being eaten up by expenses and debts, I blurted out:  “Well, what will you give me to clear out and let you and your red-headed woodpecker alone?”

“Now,” said he, “you are talking sensibly—­sensibly.  There is a little farm-out near Blue Mounds that I could, by a hard struggle, let you have; but it would be more than your share—­more than your share.”