Roy snapped to efficient attention. “I’ll get my clos’,” he said and ran for the house. As he tore back with his satchel Cal stood in his way.
“Hey,” Cal said, “I thought your name was Joe.”
“How do you mean, Joe?”
“You told us to call you Joe. Mr. Hamilton says you’re Roy.”
Roy laughed and jumped into the roadster. “Know why I say call me Joe?”
“No. Why?”
“Because my name is Roy.” In the midst of his laughter he stopped and said sternly to Adam, “You get that book under the seat and you study up. Hear me?”
“I will,” said Adam.
Chapter 30
1
Even as in Biblical times, there were miracles on the earth in those days. One week after the lesson a Ford bumped up the main street of King City and pulled to a shuddering stop in front of the post office. Adam sat at the wheel with Lee beside him and the two boys straight and grand in the back seat.
Adam looked down at the floorboards, and all four chanted in unison, “Brake on—advance gas—switch off.” The little engine roared and then stopped. Adam sat back for a moment, limp but proud, before he got out.
The postmaster looked out between the bars of his golden grill. “I see you’ve got one of the damn things,” he said.
“Have to keep up with the times,” said Adam.
“I predict there’ll come a time when you can’t find a horse, Mr. Trask.”
“Maybe so.”
“They’ll change the face of the countryside. They get their clatter into everything,” the postmaster went on. “We even feel it here. Man used to come for his mail once a week. Now he comes every day, sometimes twice a day. He just can’t wait for his damn catalogue. Running around. Always running around.” He was so violent in his dislike that Adam knew he hadn’t bought a Ford yet. It was a kind of jealousy coming out. “I wouldn’t have one around,” the postmaster said, and this meant that his wife was at him to buy one. It was the women who put the pressure on. Social status was involved.
The postmaster angrily shuffled through the letters from the T box and tossed out a long envelope. “Well, I’ll see you in the hospital,” he said viciously.
Adam smiled at him and took his letter and walked out.
A man who gets few letters does not open one lightly. He hefts it for weight, reads the name of the sender on the envelope and the address, looks at the handwriting, and studies the postmark and the date. Adam was out of the post office and across the sidewalk to his Ford before he had done all of these things. The left-hand corner of the envelope had printed on it, Bellows and Harvey, Attorneys at Law, and their address was the town in Connecticut from which Adam had come.
He said in a pleasant tone, “Why, I know Bellows and Harvey, know them well. I wonder what they want?” He looked closely at the envelope. “I wonder how they got my address?” He turned the envelope over and looked at the back. Lee watched him, smiling. “Maybe the questions are answered in the letter.”
“I guess so,” Adam said. Once having decided to open the letter, he took out his pocketknife, opened the big blade, and inspected the envelope for a point of ingress, found none, held the letter up to the sun to make sure not to cut the message, tapped the letter to one end of the envelope, and cut off the other end. He blew in the end and extracted the letter with two fingers. He read the letter very slowly.
“Mr. Adam Trask, King City, California, Dear Sir,” it began testily, “For the last six months we have exhausted every means of locating you. We have advertised in newspapers all over the country without success. It was only when your letter to your brother was turned over to us by the local postmaster that we were able to ascertain your whereabouts.” Adam could feel their impatience with him. The next paragraph began a complete change of mood. “It is our sad duty to inform you that your brother Charles Trask is deceased. He died of a lung ailment October 12 after an illness of two weeks, and his body rests in the Odd Fellows cemetery. No stone marks his grave. We presume you will want to undertake this sorrowful duty yourself.”
Adam drew a deep full breath and held it while he read the paragraph again. He breathed out slowly to keep the release from being a sigh. “My brother Charles is dead,” he said.
“I’m sorry,” said Lee.
Cal said, “Is he our uncle?”
“He was your Uncle Charles,” said Adam.
“Mine too?” Aron asked.
“Yours too.”
“I didn’t know we had him,” Aron said. “Maybe we can put some flowers on his grave. Abra would help us. She likes to.”
“It’s a long way off—clear across the country.”
Aron said excitedly, “I know! When we take flowers to our mother we’ll take some to our Uncle Charles.” And he said a little sadly, “I wish’t I knew I had him before he was dead.” He felt that he was growing rich in dead relatives. “Was he nice?” Aron asked.
“Very nice,” said Adam. “He was my only brother, just like Cal is your only brother.”
“Were you twins too?”
“No—not twins.”
Cal asked, “Was he rich?”
“Of course not,” said Adam. “Where’d you get that idea?”
“Well, if he was rich we’d get it, wouldn’t we?”
Adam said sternly, “At a time of death it isn’t a nice thing to talk about money. We’re sad because he died.”
“How can I be sad?” said Cal. “I never even saw him.”
Lee covered his mouth with his hand to conceal his smile. Adam looked back at the letter, and again it changed mood with its paragraph.
“As attorneys for the deceased it is our pleasant duty to inform you that your brother through industry and judgment amassed a considerable fortune, which in land, securities, and cash is well in excess of one hundred thousand dollars. His will, which was drawn and signed in this office, is in our hands and will be sent to you on your request. By its terms it leaves all money, property, and securities to be divided equally between you and your wife. In the event that your wife is deceased, the total goes to you. The will also stipulates that if you are deceased, all property goes to your wife. We judge from your letter that you are still in the land of the living and we wish to offer our congratulations. Your obedient servants, Bellows and Harvey, by George B. Harvey.” And at the bottom of the page was scrawled, “Dear Adam: Forget not thy servants in the days of thy prosperity. Charles never spent a dime. He pinched a dollar until the eagle screamed. I hope you and your wife will get some pleasure from the money. Is there an opening out there for a good lawyer? I mean myself. Your old friend, Geo. Harvey.”
Adam looked over the edge of the letter at the boys and at Lee. All three were waiting for him to continue. Adam’s mouth shut to a line. He folded the letter, put it in its envelope, and placed the envelope carefully in his inside pocket.
“Any complications?” Lee asked.
“No.”
“I just thought you looked concerned.”
“I’m not. I’m sad about my brother.” Adam was trying to arrange the letter’s information in his mind, and it was as restless as a setting hen scrounging into the nest. He felt that he would have to be alone to absorb it. He climbed into the car and looked blankly at the mechanism. He couldn’t remember a single procedure.
Lee asked, “Want some help?”
“Funny!” said Adam. “I can’t remember where to start.”
Lee and the boys began softly, “Spark up—gas down, switch over to Bat.”
“Oh, yes. Of course, of course.” And while the loud bee hummed in the coil box Adam cranked the Ford and ran to advance the spark and throw the switch to Mag.
They were driving slowly up the lumpy road of the home draw under the oak trees when Lee said, “We forgot to get meat.”
“Did we? I guess we did. Well, can’t we have something else?”
“How about bacon and eggs?”
“That’s fine. That’s good.”
“You’ll want to mail your answer tomorrow,” said Lee. “You can buy meat then.”
“I guess so,” said Adam.
While dinner was preparing Adam sat staring into space. He knew he would have to have help from Lee, if only the help of a listener to clear his own thinking.
Cal had led his brother outside and conducted him to the wagon shed where the tall Ford rested. Cal opened the door and sat behind the wheel. “Come on, get in!” he said.