The $30,000 Bequest, Mark Twain [best book club books for discussion TXT] 📗
- Author: Mark Twain
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THE $30,000 BEQUEST
and Other Stories
by
Mark Twain
(Samuel L. Clemens)
CONTENTS
The $30,000 Bequest
A Dog’s Tale
Was It Heaven? Or Hell?
A Cure for the Blues
The Enemy Conquered; or, Love Triumphant
The Californian’s Tale
A Helpless Situation
A Telephonic Conversation
Edward Mills and George Benton: A Tale
The Five Boons of Life
The First Writing-machines
Italian without a Master
Italian with Grammar
A Burlesque Biography
How to Tell a Story
General Washington’s Negro Body-servant
Wit Inspirations of the “Two-year-olds”
An Entertaining Article
A Letter to the Secretary of the Treasury
Amended Obituaries
A Monument to Adam
A Humane Word from Satan
Introduction to “The New Guide of the
Conversation in Portuguese and English”
Advice to Little Girls
Post-mortem Poetry
The Danger of Lying in Bed
Portrait of King William III
Does the Race of Man Love a Lord?
Extracts from Adam’s Diary
Eve’s Diary
***
THE $30,000 BEQUEST
Lakeside was a pleasant little town of five or six thousand inhabitants,
and a rather pretty one, too, as towns go in the Far West.
It had church accommodations for thirty-five thousand, which is
the way of the Far West and the South, where everybody is religious,
and where each of the Protestant sects is represented and has a plant
of its own. Rank was unknown in Lakeside—unconfessed, anyway;
everybody knew everybody and his dog, and a sociable friendliness
was the prevailing atmosphere.
Saladin Foster was book-keeper in the principal store, and the only
high-salaried man of his profession in Lakeside. He was thirty-five
years old, now; he had served that store for fourteen years;
he had begun in his marriage-week at four hundred dollars a year,
and had climbed steadily up, a hundred dollars a year, for four years;
from that time forth his wage had remained eight hundred—a handsome
figure indeed, and everybody conceded that he was worth it.
His wife, Electra, was a capable helpmeet, although—like himself—
a dreamer of dreams and a private dabbler in romance. The first thing
she did, after her marriage—child as she was, aged only nineteen—
was to buy an acre of ground on the edge of the town, and pay
down the cash for it—twenty-five dollars, all her fortune.
Saladin had less, by fifteen. She instituted a vegetable garden there,
got it farmed on shares by the nearest neighbor, and made it pay
her a hundred per cent. a year. Out of Saladin’s first year’s wage
she put thirty dollars in the savings-bank, sixty out of his second,
a hundred out of his third, a hundred and fifty out of his fourth.
His wage went to eight hundred a year, then, and meantime two children
had arrived and increased the expenses, but she banked two hundred
a year from the salary, nevertheless, thenceforth. When she had been
married seven years she built and furnished a pretty and comfortable
two-thousand-dollar house in the midst of her garden-acre, paid
half of the money down and moved her family in. Seven years later
she was out of debt and had several hundred dollars out earning
its living.
Earning it by the rise in landed estate; for she had long ago bought
another acre or two and sold the most of it at a profit to pleasant
people who were willing to build, and would be good neighbors and
furnish a general comradeship for herself and her growing family.
She had an independent income from safe investments of about a hundred
dollars a year; her children were growing in years and grace;
and she was a pleased and happy woman. Happy in her husband, happy in
her children, and the husband and the children were happy in her.
It is at this point that this history begins.
The youngest girl, Clytemnestra—called Clytie for short—
was eleven; her sister, Gwendolen—called Gwen for short—
was thirteen; nice girls, and comely. The names betray the latent
romance-tinge in the parental blood, the parents’ names indicate
that the tinge was an inheritance. It was an affectionate family,
hence all four of its members had pet names, Saladin’s was a curious
and unsexing one—Sally; and so was Electra’s—Aleck. All day
long Sally was a good and diligent book-keeper and salesman;
all day long Aleck was a good and faithful mother and housewife,
and thoughtful and calculating business woman; but in the cozy
living-room at night they put the plodding world away, and lived in
another and a fairer, reading romances to each other, dreaming dreams,
comrading with kings and princes and stately lords and ladies in the
flash and stir and splendor of noble palaces and grim and ancient castles.
Now came great news! Stunning news—joyous news, in fact.
It came from a neighboring state, where the family’s only surviving
relative lived. It was Sally’s relative—a sort of vague and indefinite
uncle or second or third cousin by the name of Tilbury Foster,
seventy and a bachelor, reputed well off and corresponding sour
and crusty. Sally had tried to make up to him once, by letter,
in a bygone time, and had not made that mistake again. Tilbury now
wrote to Sally, saying he should shortly die, and should leave him
thirty thousand dollars, cash; not for love, but because money
had given him most of his troubles and exasperations, and he wished
to place it where there was good hope that it would continue its
malignant work. The bequest would be found in his will, and would
be paid over. PROVIDED, that Sally should be able to prove to the
executors that he had TAKEN NO NOTICE OF THE GIFT BY SPOKEN WORD OR
BY LETTER, HAD MADE NO INQUIRIES CONCERNING THE MORIBUND’S PROGRESS
TOWARD THE EVERLASTING TROPICS, AND HAD NOT ATTENDED THE FUNERAL.
As soon as Aleck had partially recovered from the tremendous
emotions created by the letter, she sent to the relative’s habitat
and subscribed for the local paper.
Man and wife entered into a solemn compact, now, to never mention
the great news to any one while the relative lived, lest some
ignorant person carry the fact to the death-bed and distort it
and make it appear that they were disobediently thankful for
the bequest, and just the same as confessing it and publishing it,
right in the face of the prohibition.
For the rest of the day Sally made havoc and confusion with his books,
and Aleck could not keep her mind on her affairs, not even take up
a flower-pot or book or a stick of wood without forgetting what she
had intended to do with it. For both were dreaming.
“Thir-ty thousand dollars!”
All day long the music of those inspiring words sang through
those people’s heads.
From his marriage-day forth, Aleck’s grip had been upon the purse,
and Sally had seldom known what it was to be privileged to squander
a dime on non-necessities.
“Thir-ty thousand dollars!” the song went on and on. A vast sum,
an unthinkable sum!
All day long Aleck was absorbed in planning how to invest it,
Sally in planning how to spend it.
There was no romance-reading that night. The children took
themselves away early, for their parents were silent, distraught,
and strangely unentertaining. The good-night kisses might as well
have been impressed upon vacancy, for all the response they got;
the parents were not aware of the kisses, and the children had
been gone an hour before their absence was noticed. Two pencils
had been busy during that hour—note-making; in the way of plans.
It was Sally who broke the stillness at last. He said, with exultation:
“Ah, it’ll be grand, Aleck! Out of the first thousand we’ll have
a horse and a buggy for summer, and a cutter and a skin lap-robe
for winter.”
Aleck responded with decision and composure—
“Out of the CAPITAL? Nothing of the kind. Not if it was a million!”
Sally was deeply disappointed; the glow went out of his face.
“Oh, Aleck!” he said, reproachfully. “We’ve always worked so hard
and been so scrimped: and now that we are rich, it does seem—”
He did not finish, for he saw her eye soften; his supplication
had touched her. She said, with gentle persuasiveness:
“We must not spend the capital, dear, it would not be wise.
Out of the income from it—”
“That will answer, that will answer, Aleck! How dear and good you are!
There will be a noble income and if we can spend that—”
“Not ALL of it, dear, not all of it, but you can spend a part of it.
That is, a reasonable part. But the whole of the capital—
every penny of it—must be put right to work, and kept at it.
You see the reasonableness of that, don’t you?”
“Why, ye-s. Yes, of course. But we’ll have to wait so long.
Six months before the first interest falls due.”
“Yes—maybe longer.”
“Longer, Aleck? Why? Don’t they pay half-yearly?”
“THAT kind of an investment—yes; but I sha’n’t invest in that way.”
“What way, then?”
“For big returns.”
“Big. That’s good. Go on, Aleck. What is it?”
“Coal. The new mines. Cannel. I mean to put in ten thousand.
Ground floor. When we organize, we’ll get three shares for one.”
“By George, but it sounds good, Aleck! Then the shares will be worth—
how much? And when?”
“About a year. They’ll pay ten per cent. half yearly, and be
worth thirty thousand. I know all about it; the advertisement
is in the Cincinnati paper here.”
“Land, thirty thousand for ten—in a year! Let’s jam in the whole
capital and pull out ninety! I’ll write and subscribe right now—
tomorrow it maybe too late.”
He was flying to the writing-desk, but Aleck stopped him and put
him back in his chair. She said:
“Don’t lose your head so. WE mustn’t subscribe till we’ve got
the money; don’t you know that?”
Sally’s excitement went down a degree or two, but he was not
wholly appeased.
“Why, Aleck, we’ll HAVE it, you know—and so soon, too. He’s probably
out of his troubles before this; it’s a hundred to nothing he’s
selecting his brimstone-shovel this very minute. Now, I think—”
Aleck shuddered, and said:
“How CAN you, Sally! Don’t talk in that way, it is perfectly scandalous.”
“Oh, well, make it a halo, if you like, I don’t care for his outfit,
I was only just talking. Can’t you let a person talk?”
“But why should you WANT to talk in that dreadful way? How would
you like to have people talk so about YOU, and you not cold yet?”
“Not likely to be, for ONE while, I reckon, if my last act was
giving away money for the sake of doing somebody a harm with it.
But never mind about Tilbury, Aleck, let’s talk about something worldly.
It does seem to me that that mine is the place for the whole thirty.
What’s the objection?”
“All the eggs in one basket—that’s the objection.”
“All right, if you say so. What about the other twenty?
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