No fighting, IF you please. And if anybody wants to
know who's boss around here, start something.'"
And Shirley laid her head upon the dressing-table and laughed
heartily. She had suddenly bethought herself of Aesop's fable of the
lion and the mouse!
When her uncle came home that night, Shirley observed that he was
preoccupied and disinclined to conversation.
"I noticed in this evening's paper," she remarked presently, "that
Mr. Cardigan has sold his Valley of the Giants. So you bought it,
after all?"
"No such luck!" he almost barked. "I'm an idiot. I should be placed
in charge of a keeper. Now, for heaven's sake, Shirley, don't discuss
that timber with me, for if you do, I'll go plain, lunatic crazy.
I've had a very trying day."
"Poor Uncle Seth!" she purred sweetly. Her apparent sympathy soothed
his rasped soul. He continued:
"Oh, I'll get the infernal property, and it will be worth what I have
to pay for it, only it certainly does gravel me to realize that I am
about to be held up, with no help in sight. I'll see Judge Moore to-
morrow and offer him a quick profit for his client. That's the game,
you know."
"I do hope the new owner exhibits some common sense, Uncle dear," she
replied, and turned back to the piano. "But I greatly fear," she
added to herself, "that the new owner is going to prove a most
obstinate creature and frightfully hard to discover.
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