"Huh! Any man who can afford to send his sons out West on a pleasure trip ought to have the money to pay his interest," retorted Mr. Jimson.

"My sons did not go on a pleasure trip," answered Mr. Crosby. "They went to hunt for gold."

"And a mighty foolish excursion it was, too. Why didn't you send them to hunt for the fairy bag of gold at the foot of the rainbow? There would have been about as much sense in it."

"They went with an experienced miner, Mr. Jimson. Besides, my boys had earned a vacation."

"Oh, they had, eh? Then why don't they send back some gold nuggets? Why don't they pay the interest?"

"They would if they could. Can't you wait a few weeks? I may be able to get it together again. Or the officers may catch that cashier and get some of the money back."

"I'll not wait one day. As for catching that cashier, I don't believe they'll do it. The money is gone. You know what the agreement is in the mortgage. Either you pay up my interest the day it is due, or take the consequences."

"And what are the consequences?" asked Mrs. Crosby, who had been an anxious listener to this conversation.

"The farm will be sold," replied Mr. Jimson. "That is my right and privilege. All I get above the amount of the mortgage and the sheriff's fee will go to you, of course, but I don't imagine it will be much. Now I haven't any time to stand here talking to you. Have you my interest?

Yes or no. To-day is the day it's due."

"I'm sorry, but I haven't got it," replied Mr. Crosby.

"All right; then I'll instruct the sheriff to sell the farm."

"Oh, you wouldn't do that, would you?" exclaimed Mrs. Crosby.

"Of course I will. Why not? That's business. I don't lend money for fun.

You'd better get ready to move. Maybe you can go out West and dig gold."

And with that mean reminder Mr. Jimson drove off.

The misfortune was such a terrible one that at first the Crosby family could hardly realize it. They were stunned. But it was not long before they awoke to a realization of what it meant.

Mr. Crosby tried in vain to raise the money, so unexpectedly lost, to pay the interest. He could borrow from no one, as he had nothing he could offer as security. He had a small sum put away for the needs of the winter, but this he knew it would be unsafe to touch.

So a few days after the visit of Mr. Jimson, notices were put up on the house, barn and other buildings of the farm, stating that they would be sold at public auction, under foreclosure proceedings, because the interest on the mortgage was unpaid.

And some time later that sad event happened. Quite a crowd of farmers gathered at the Crosby farm to bid on it. It was a good piece of land, but times were dull, and when all expenses had been met, including the mortgage, interest and sheriff's fees, there was only a few hundred dollars left for Mr. Crosby, his wife and daughter. Most of their possessions had been sold, as a chattel mortgage had been given as a last resort to raise the cash for the interest.

"And this is what I have left after twenty years of hard work," said Mr.

Crosby sadly when the auction was over and he had received the few hundred dollars.

CHAPTER XXV

THE WELCOME LETTER--CONCLUSION

"Well, what are we going to do now?" asked Mrs. Crosby as a little later she, with her husband and daughter, sat in their desolate home.

"We've got to do something," replied Mr. Crosby. "I've got to make a new start, I suppose, and it comes hard at my time of life."

"Let me help, daddy," said Nettie, putting her arm around her father's neck. "I heard of a good place in the woolen mill. I can earn four dollars a week."

"Not while I have health and strength," replied Mr. Crosby. "We'll manage to make out somehow," he added more cheerfully, for now that the worst had happened, he was ready to face anything.

"The boys ought to know about this," said Mrs. Crosby. "Maybe they have found a gold mine and can help us."

"Not much chance of that," responded her husband. "But I would like to hear from them. We haven't had a letter since they got to the mountains, and the last time they wrote they were about to start for Dizzy Gulch.

We can't expect any help from them, but perhaps they will want to come back, now that we have lost our farm. Probably we three can get work on some place--enough to earn a living, anyhow."

"It will seem strange to be working for some one else, when you have had your own farm so many years," said Mrs. Crosby.

"A man's farm isn't very much his when there's a mortgage on it. Never again will I try to live under such conditions. Why, I feel almost happy, now that I know there is no interest to meet. We will go somewhere else and begin life over again."

"Yes, and we've got to go somewhere to-night," added Nettie with a laugh, the first real one since their misfortune. "We have no beds here--nearly everything was sold. What are we going to do, daddy--sleep in the barn, in the hay? Do you suppose the sheriff would let us?"

"No need for that," replied her father. "We'll go to the hotel to-night.

In the morning I will consider matters, and decide what is best to do.

But I think I'll write a letter to the boys and tell them the bad news as gently as possible. Have you their address, Nettie?"

"Yes, father, but I imagine they must be in the mountains now."

"Well, mail will probably be forwarded. I'll ask them if they made out any worse with their gold hunting than I did with my farming."

But though he made light of it, Mr. Crosby was a man broken in spirit.

Through no fault of his own he found himself, in the decline of life, with hardly enough to live on half a year, and no prospects of anything better. Still he did not despair.

The little family went to the village hotel that evening. Many of their neighbors, who sympathized with them, invited them to share their homes, but Mr. Crosby thought it would be less embarra.s.sing for his wife and daughter if they went to the hotel.

It was on the way there that Mr. Hayson, the village postmaster, stopped Mr. Crosby on the street.

"Sorry to hear of your bad luck," he said.

"It might have been worse," replied Mr. Crosby.

"Yes, but not much. I was on my way over to your place. I got a special-delivery letter for you, but as I didn't have anybody I could send with it, and as you didn't call, I had to keep it until I closed the office up. Here it is," and he drew from his pocket a rather soiled envelope with a blue stamp thereon.

"Must have come a good way," remarked the postmaster. "I couldn't make out where, the marks were so blurred."

"Why, it's Jed's writing!" exclaimed Mr. Crosby.

"Jed? Your son?"

"Yes. He and his brother are in the West looking for gold, but I don't suppose they'll find any."

Mr. Crosby opened the letter and rapidly read it. As he did so the expression on his face changed. The look of care seemed to disappear, and his eyes brightened.

"Looks as if it was good news," observed Mr. Hayson, who was an old acquaintance.