When Egypt Went Broke, Holman Day [free ereaders .txt] 📗

to be moving. These are busy times for me."
"But you don't say when you're coming back, Joe!" quavered his wife.
"Why should I begin to set dates now, when I never have in past times?"
"Oh, I suppose it's because we've got so used to having you at home," she confessed.
"I'm leaving matters in better shape than I ever did before," said Mr. Harnden, pompously. "I have been worried about my home in the past when I have had to be absent on my business. We have Tasper in the house now. And he will not only guard and protect, but he will pay as he goes. I may not go far or stay long. Just let it stand that way. Tell inquiring friends that. I'll keep you posted. You know what my business is; it takes me here--it takes me there." He gave his wife a peck of a kiss and patted Vona's shoulder when he passed her. He picked up a valise in the hallway.
The girl followed him. "Father, always when you have been away, mother and I have felt perfectly comfortable and safe here in our home. If Mr. Britt hasn't the sense or the good taste to go somewhere else to board, won't you suggest to him that he'd better do so?"
"Nothing of the sort, Vona!" declared Harnden. "That contractor has brought a lot of strangers here to work on Britt's house, seeing that the men of this town are biting off their noses to spite their faces! I wouldn't take a minute's peace, knowing that my home is unprotected, unless I felt that a friend of mine was here as guardian. Oh, I know what you mean! But I have the safety of my family to consider instead of a girl's whims."
She did not argue the matter. His peppery impatience was increasing. This time he was not departing with his customary bland hopefulness. She knew the sort of selfishness her father possessed and how he avoided scenes that troubled his smug serenity. But on this occasion he seemed to be impelled by some urgent reason outside of mere anxiety to be away from complaining tongues.
He hurried out of the house and went to the stable, and she said no further word.
Ten minutes later he drove away, flinging a kiss to his womenfolks from the finger tips of the yellow gloves.
He headed directly out of the village and drove at a good clip.
However, one might have concluded that Mr. Harnden's destination was not as clearly settled in his mind as the haste of his departure suggested. When he came to four corners he pulled up and looked to right and to left and to the straight ahead. Mr. Harnden was too well acquainted with all the roads of Egypt and its environs to be confused by anything except strictly personal and peculiar doubts which had nothing to do with the matter of destination. He looked up into the heavens, as if he really wished that he might be able to escape from Egypt by flight. Then he did literally what the Yankee phrase suggests by way of synonym for taking counsel--"he looked between the horse's ears." He narrowed his eyes in meditation and spoke aloud. "I reckon it's only general nervousness on account of overwork and women's foolishness. There ain't one chance in ten that they'll get around to it to-day."
Arriving at that comfortable conclusion, Mr. Harnden lighted a cigar and chirruped to his horse and drove straight on.
The road zigzagged through an alder swamp for some distance, and the horse footed along slowly because a portion of the way was patched with sapling "corduroy." And with the impulse of a man who had been obliged to waste time, and saw an opportunity to get on, Harnden whipped up when he was again facing a smooth road. Therefore he came suddenly around the bend of the alders into cleared country and abreast a farm. It was a farm made up of the alluvial soil of the lowlands and was a rather pretentious tract of tillage, compared with the other hillside apologies of Egypt. And the buildings were in fairly good repair. It was the home of Jared Sparks Grant, the first selectman of the town.
Mr. Harnden did not look to right or left as his horse trotted past. He did not appear to be interested in the affairs of Egyptians that day--even in the case of the town's chief executive. When Harnden was hailed raucously he did not pull up, though he heard his name. After a few moments a gun banged behind him.
"I'm saving the other barrel," the voice announced, after Harnden had steered his horse from the gutter into the road; the animal had been frightened by the pattering of shot in the foliage of a tree overhead. "You'll get it straight, Harnden, unless you drive back here!"
When Harnden wheeled the horse and returned he perceived a dooryard group which he had affected not to see a few moments before.
There were Jared Sparks Grant, his son, his womenfolks, his hired man; Mr. Harnden recognized all of them, of course. He also recognized Deputy-sheriff Wagner Dowd from the shire town. Dowd had a couple of helpers with him. It was plain that the shotgun which had halted Mr. Harnden had been very nigh at hand and ready for use; there was a look about the folks in the dooryard which suggested an armed truce, now prolonged, for the handling of the new arrival.
"Don't you realize what's going on here?" demanded Selectman Grant, his weapon in the hook of his arm.
"No!" asserted Mr. Harnden.
"I know a blamed sight better! You can't look at this deputy sheriff without turning redder than one of the apples in that fake picture book of yours. You know what you have been doing in this town."
The selectman's tone was offensively harsh and loud. Mr. Harnden was moved to show a little spirit, having been cornered--and feeling protected by the presence of an officer of the law. "I have been doing business!"
"Scooping in town orders, you mean!"
"Taking them in the due course of my business, Mr. Selectman. I had a right to do it!"
"And what did you do with those orders?"
"I passed them on--still in the course of my business."
"And you don't know into whose hands they have come?"
"Oh no!"
The selectman stepped close to the carriage and brandished his gun. "While this town was staggering along, trying to find a way out, only a hellion would take and make a club out of those orders and hit us the last and final clip with 'em. You've done it, Harnden! For the sake of the dirty money you've done it. They were letting those orders rest easy till we could get the legislature and have things put into some condition where we'd know what's what. Through your work some land pirate has got hold of those town orders. There isn't a cent in the town treasury. You know it."
He whirled away from Harnden and shook the gun at the deputy sheriff.
"I sha'n't believe your law, Dowd, till I've been and talked with Squire Hexter."
"Go and talk! But in the meantime a good lawyer has told me what to do and has given me the documents, and I'm not trying the case in your dooryard. I have levied on those oxen and I shall take 'em along."
"Do you hear that, Harnden? That's what you have done to your town," bellowed the infuriated selectman. "He says there's a law allowing a creditor to levy on the property of any citizen of a town to satisfy a judgment. Judgment has been secured on those town orders. They are jumping on me first."
"It's what the lawyer told me to do," insisted the officer. "'Start with the selectman,' says he. 'That shows the others where they get off.' Grant, I'm here with the papers and the right to act." He advanced close to the selectman, waggling admonitory forefinger. "I've been excusing your feelings. I don't blame you! This is tough. It's the penalty you pay for living in such a town. But I don't propose to stand for any more of that gunplay. Hand it over!"
Grant hesitated. The officer snatched away the gun, broke it down, and pulled out the undischarged shell. He put that into his pocket and shoved the gun under the seat of a wagon. "You can have this gun back after the war is over. Now to business! You claim that the oxen are exempt because you have no horses. All right! I see you have a dozen cows. I'll take three of those. I'm fair, you see! You're only entitled to one cow. But keep nine. I'm going to spread the thing around town till I have enough to satisfy this judgment. It's for one hundred and ninety dollars. What say, now? Do you want to pay a fine for obstructing an officer?"
Selectman Grant shook his head. The flame of his rage had died down into sullen rancor. He went along to Harnden's carriage and suddenly nipped that gentleman's nose between toil-calloused index and middle fingers. "They tell me there's no law against doing this," he said between his yellow, hard-set teeth, as he twisted at the nose, while Harnden's eyes ran water. "If there is a law, I hope you'll stay handy by in this town and prosecute while we're heating the tar and getting the feathers ready."
Sheriff Dowd took advantage of Selectman Grant's preoccupation with Harnden. He gave off orders to his helpers and they lowered the bars of the barnyard and started away with the cows.
There was a general disintegration of the group. Mrs. Grant led the lamenting womenfolk into the house. Mr. Harnden did not really extricate his nose; Grant twisted so violently that he broke his own grip, and his victim laced the whip under the horse's belly and escaped.
Within ten minutes Selectman Grant was whipping his own horse in a direction opposite to that which Harnden had taken. Mr. Grant was hot after law.
Squire Hexter gave him the law, and cold comfort.
"They can do it, Jared. Outsiders can get hold of unpaid town orders and put on the screws if they're that heartless. It isn't done once in a dog's age. But, as I say, it can be done when a creditor is ugly enough. Harnden didn't say, did he, just who brought the orders?"
"I wouldn't have believed him if he did say! But he didn't say."
"And you don't know the man who secured judgment?"
"Never heard of him."
"I will try to trace the matter, Jared. No, keep your wallet in your pocket. There's no charge. It's a case where the interests of the citizens in general are concerned. I'm the regularly elected town agent, as you know!" The Squire smiled. "I'll take a town order for my pay." He looked out of the window. "It's about time for somebody else to come larruping up here after law! Don't hurry, Jared! Wait and hear what's happened to the neighbors!"
The selectman sat gloomily, elbows squared on his knees, and waited. Almost opposite the Squire's office the rattle-te-bang business on Britt's premises was going on.
"I wonder whether Tasper will dare to go ahead and build his palace after he hears the latest news," suggested the Squire. "You must be told, Jared, that after the live stock of the town has been thinned down to the essentials permitted by law, then the farms and general real estate can be levied on."
Grant lifted his haggard face and stared at the Squire. "Then, outside of the cook stove and my clothes, I don't know whether I'm worth a blasted cent, hey? They can dreen me slow with a