“I put the question,” said Mr. Spackles, with the air of a youth of twenty, “and Ellen up and allowed she’d have me.  But I guess ’twon’t never come off now.  Seems like I’ll never be content ag’in, and Ellen’s that downcast I shouldn’t be a mite s’prised if she jest give up and passed away.”

“Difficulty’s money, hain’t it?  Largely financial, eh?”

“Ya-as.”

“Folks has got rich before.  Maybe somethin’ like that’ll happen to you.”

“Have to happen mighty suddin, Scattergood, if it aims to do any good in this world.”

“I’ve knowed men to invest a couple hunderd dollars into some venture and come out at t’other end with thousands.  You got couple hunderd, hain’t you?”

“Ellen and me both has—­saved up to bury us.”

“Um!...  Git buried, anyhow.  Law compels it.  Doggone little pleasure spendin’ money f’r your own coffin.  More sensible to git some good out of it....  I’m goin’ away to the city f’r a week or sich a matter.  When I come back we’ll kind of thrash things out and see what’s to be done.  Meantime, don’t you and Grandmother Penny up and elope.”

In this manner Scattergood planted the get-rich-quick idea in the head of Mr. Spackles, who communicated it to Grandmother Penny in the course of a clandestine meeting.  The old folks discussed it, and hope made it seem more and more plausible to them.  Realizing the fewness of the days remaining to them, they were anxious to utilize every moment.  It was Grandmother Penny who was the daring spirit.  She was for drawing their money out of the bank that very day and investing it somehow, somewhere, in the hope of seeing it come back to them a hundredfold.

Scattergood had neglected to take into consideration Grandmother Penny’s adventuresome spirit; he had also neglected to avail himself of the information that a certain Mr. Baxter, registered from Boston, was at the hotel, and that his business was selling shares of stock in a mine which did not exist to gullible folks who wanted to become wealthy without spending any labor in the process.  He did a thriving business.  It was Coldriver’s first experience with this particular method of extracting money from the public, and it came to the front handsomely.  Mr. Spackles got wind of the opportunity and told it to Grandmother Penny.  She took charge of affairs, compelled her fiance to go with her to the bank, where they withdrew their savings, and then sought for Mr. Baxter, who, in return for a bulk sum of some five hundred dollars, sold them enough stock in the mine to paper the parlor.  Also, he promised them enormous returns in an exceedingly brief space of time.  Their profit on the transaction would, he assured them, be not less than ten thousand dollars, and might mount to double that sum.  They departed in a state of extreme elation, and but for Mr. Spackles’s conservatism Grandmother Penny would have eloped with him then and there.

“I’d like to, Ellen.  I’d like to, mighty well, but ’tain’t safe.  Le’s git the money fust.  The minnit the money comes in, off we mog to the parson.  But ’tain’t safe yit.  Jest hold your hosses.”