other quarters. He walked on until he reached the old Bolton house. The door stood open, askew upon rusty hinges. Wesley Elliot entered and glanced about him with growing curiosity. The room was obviously a kitchen, one side being occupied by a huge brick chimney inclosing a built-in range half devoured with rust; wall cupboards, a sink and a decrepit table showed gray and ugly in the greenish light of two tall windows, completely blocked on the outside with over-grown shrubs. An indescribable odor of decaying plaster, chimney-soot and mildew hung in the heavy air.
A door to the right, also half open, led the investigator further. Here the floor shook ominously under foot, suggesting rotten beams and unsteady sills. The minister walked cautiously, noting in passing a portrait defaced with cobwebs over the marble mantelpiece and the great circular window opening upon an expanse of tangled grass and weeds, through which the sun streamed hot and yellow. Voices came from an adjoining room; he could hear Deacon Whittle's nasal tones upraised in fervid assertion.
“Yes, ma'am!” he was saying, “this house is a little out of repair, you can see that fer yourself; but it's well built; couldn't be better. A few hundred dollars expended here an' there'll make it as good as new; in fact, I'll say better'n new! They don't put no such material in houses nowadays. Why, this woodwork—doors, windows, floors and all—is clear, white pine. You can't buy it today for no price. Costs as much as m'hogany, come to figure it out. Yes, ma'am! the woodwork alone in this house is worth the price of one of them little new shacks a builder'll run up in a couple of months. And look at them mantelpieces, pure tombstone marble; and all carved like you see. Yes, ma'am! there's as many as seven of 'em in the house. Where'll you find anything like that, I'd like to know!”
“I—think the house might be made to look very pleasant, Mr. Whittle,” Lydia replied, in a hesitating voice.
Wesley Elliot fancied he could detect a slight tremor in its even flow. He pushed open the door and walked boldly in.
“Good-morning, Miss Orr,” he exclaimed, advancing with outstretched hand. “Good-morning, Deacon! … Well, well! what a melancholy old ruin this is, to be sure. I never chanced to see the interior before.”
Deacon Whittle regarded his pastor sourly from under puckered brows.
“Some s'prised to see you, dominie,” said he. “Thought you was generally occupied at your desk of a Friday morning.”
The minister included Lydia Orr in the genial warmth of his smile as he replied:
“I had a special call into the country this morning, and seeing your conveyance hitched to the trees outside, Deacon, I thought I'd step in. I'm not sure it's altogether safe for all of us to be standing in the middle of this big room, though. Sills pretty well rotted out—eh, Deacon?”
“Sound as an oak,” snarled the Deacon. “As I was telling th' young lady, there ain't no better built house anywheres 'round than this one. Andrew Bolton didn't spare other folks' money when he built it—no, sir! It's good for a hundred years yet, with trifling repairs.”
“Who owns the house now?” asked Lydia unexpectedly. She had walked over to one of the long windows opening on a rickety balcony and stood looking out.
“Who owns it?” echoed Deacon Whittle. “Well, now, we can give you a clear title, ma'am, when it comes to that; sound an' clear. You don't have to worry none about that. You see it was this way; dunno as anybody's mentioned it in your hearing since you come to Brookville; but we use to have a bank here in Brookville, about eighteen years ago, and—”
“Yes, Ellen Dix told me,” interrupted Lydia Orr, without turning her head. “Has nobody lived here since?”
Deacon Whittle cast an impatient glance at Wesley Elliot, who stood with his eyes fixed broodingly on the dusty floor.
“Wal,” said he. “There'd have been plenty of folks glad enough to live here; but the house wa'n't really suited to our kind o' folks. It wa'n't a farm—there being only twenty acres going with it. And you see the house is different to what folks in moderate circumstances could handle. Nobody had the cash to buy it, an' ain't had, all these years. It's a pity to see a fine old property like this a-going down, all for the lack of a few hundreds. But if you was to buy it, ma'am, I could put it in shape fer you, equal to the best, and at a figure—Wall; I tell ye, it won't cost ye what some folks'd think.”
“Didn't that man—the banker who stole—everybody's money, I mean—didn't he have any family?” asked Lydia, still without turning her head. “I suppose he—he died a long time ago?”
“I see the matter of th' title's worrying you, ma'am,” said Deacon Whittle briskly. “I like to see a female cautious in a business way: I do, indeed. And 'tain't often you see it, neither. Now, I'll tell you—”
“Wouldn't it be well to show Miss Orr some more desirable property, Deacon?” interposed Wesley Elliot. “It seems to me—”
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