she left it. He would have liked, perhaps, to have given Rose Mall twenty-five thousand or so—so she could always be independent of that young husband of hers—snap her fingers at him if he got to driving her too hard, and crushing out the flower-like quality of her—but his wife wouldn’t have understood, and he had hurt her enough, in all conscience. The one thing he might have enjoyed doing, he couldn’t. Outside of that he didn’t care who got it. She could leave it to whomever she liked when her turn came. Not to whom it went, but what would happen to it—that was what concerned him.
By his side, Rose, sitting so motionless that he was scarcely conscious of her presence, was dying with him. With that peculiar gift of profoundly sympathetic natures she was thinking and feeling much of what he was experiencing. It seemed to her heart-breaking that Martin must be forced to abandon the only things for which he cared. He had even sacrificed his lovely Rose of Sharon for them—she had never been in any doubt as to the reason for that sudden emotional retreat of his seven years before. And she knew his one thought now must be for their successful administration.
He had worked so hard always and yet had had so little happiness, so little real brightness out of life. She felt, generously, with a clutching ache, that with all the disappointments she had suffered through him—from his first broken promises about the house to his lack of understanding of their boy which had resulted in Billy’s death—with even that, she had salvaged so much more out of living than he. A great compassion swelled within her; all the black moments, all the long, gray hours of their years together, seemed suddenly insignificant. She saw him again as he had been the day he had proposed marriage to her and for the first time she was sure that she could interpret the puzzling look that had come into his eyes when she had asked him why he thought she could make him happy. What had he understood about happiness? With a noiseless sob, she remembered that he had answered her in terms of the only thing he had understood—work. And she saw him again, too, as he had been the night he had so bluntly told her of his passion for Rose. It seemed to her now, free of all rancor, unutterably tragic that the only person Martin had loved should have come into his life too late.
He was not to be blamed because he had never been able to care for herself. He should never have asked her to marry him—and yet, they had not been such bad partners. It would have been so easy for her to love him. She had loved him until he had killed her boy; since then, all her old affection had withered. But if it really had done so why was she so racked now? She felt, desperately, that she could not let him go until he had had some real joy. To think that she used to plan, cold-bloodedly, when Billy was little, all she would do if only Martin should happen to die! The memory of it smote her as with a blow. She looked down at the powerful hand lying so passively, almost, she would have said, contentedly, in her own. How she had yearned for the comfort of it when her children were born. She wondered if Martin realized her touch, if it helped a little. If it had annoyed him, he would have said so. It came to her oddly that in all the twenty-seven years she and her husband had been married this was the very first time he had let her be tender to him. Oh, his life had been bleak. Bleak! And she with such tenderness in her heart. It hadn’t been right. From the depths of her rebellion and forgiveness, slow tears rose. Feeling too intensely, too mentally, to be conscious of them she sat unmoving as they rolled one by one down her cheeks and dropped unheeded.
“Rose,” he called with a soft hoarseness, “I want to talk to you.”
“Yes, Martin,” and she gave his fingers a slight squeeze as though to convince him that she was there at his side. He felt relieved. It was good to feel her hand and be sure that if his body were to give its final sign that life had slipped away someone would be there to know the very second it had happened. It was a satisfactory way to die; it took a little of the loneliness away from the experience.
“Rose,” he repeated. It sounded so new, the yearning tone in which he said it—“Rose!” It hurt. “Isn’t it funny, Rose, to go like this—not sick, no accident—just dying without any real reason except that I absorbed the poison through a cut so small my eyes couldn’t see it.”
“It’s a mystery, dear,” the little word limped out awkwardly, “but God’s ways are not ours.”
“Not a mystery,” he corrected, “just a heap of tricks; funny ones, sad ones, sensible ones, and crazy ones—and of all the crazy ones this is the worst. But, what’s the use? If there’s a God, as you believe, it doesn’t do any good to argue with Him, and if it’s as I think and there’s no God, there’s no one to argue with. But never mind about that now—it’s no matter. You’ll listen carefully, won’t you, Rose?”
“Yes, Martin.”
“This abortion in the herd. You know what a terrible thing it is.”
“I certainly do; it’s the cause of your leaving me.”
“Rose, I know you’ll be busy during the next few days—me dying, the things that have to be arranged, the funeral and all that. But when it’s all over, you’ll let that be the first thing, won’t you?”
“Yes, the very first thing, if you wish it.”
“I do. Get Dr. Hurton on the job at once, and have him fight it. He knows his business. Let him come twice a day until he’s sure it’s out of the herd. Keep that new bull out of the pasture. And if Hurton can’t clean it up, you’d better get rid of the herd before it gets known around the country. You know how news of that kind travels. Don’t try to handle the sale yourself. If you do, it’ll be a mistake. The prices will be low if you get only a county crowd.”
“Neighbors usually bid low,” she agreed.
“Run up to Topeka and see Baker—he’s the sales manager of the Holstein Breeders’ Association. Let him take charge of it all—he’s a straight fellow. He’ll charge you enough—fifteen per cent of the gross receipts, but then he’ll see to it that the people who want good stuff will be there. He knows how and where to advertise. He’s got a big list of names, and can send out letters to the people that count. He’ll bring buyers from Iowa down to Texas. Remember his name—Baker.”
“Yes, Martin—Baker.”
“I think you ought to sell the herd anyway,” he went on. “I know you, Rose; you’ll be careless about the papers—no woman ever realizes how important it is to have the facts for the certificates of registry and transfer just right. I’m afraid you’ll fall down there and get the records mixed. You won’t get the dates exact and the name and number of each dam and sire. Women are all alike there—they never seem to realize that a purebred without papers is just a good grade.” Rose made no comment, while Martin changed his position slowly and lost himself in thought.
“Yes, I guess it’s the only thing to do—to get rid of the purebred stuff. God Almighty! It’s taken me long enough to build up that herd, but a few weeks from now they’ll be scattered to the four winds. Well, it can’t be helped. Try to sell them to men who understand something of their value. And that reminds me, Rose. You always speak of them as thoroughbreds. It always did get on my nerves. That’s right for horses, but try to remember that cows are purebreds. You’ll make that mistake before men who know. Those little things are important. Remember it, won’t you?”
“Thoroughbred for a horse, and purebred for a cow,” Rose repeated willingly.
“When you get your money for the stock put it into mortgages—first mortgages, not seconds. Let that be a principle with you. Many a holder of a second mortgage has been left to hold the sack. You must remember that the first mortgage comes in for the first claim after taxes, and if the foreclosure doesn’t bring enough to satisfy more than that, the second mortgage is sleeping on its rights.”
“First
