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Show The Babu's I Bank 1 i I i i 5 i Bu GEORGE ELMER COEB I i i C'.3mii:ictts!tsiiic:w!:3i;Bi:a::c!iioiiaiiaiaiisiwiiiiiiciEajiiij (Copyright, 1916, by W. G. Chapman.) "The tnt'ii n old luinks" ! uttered John Hanks, father of pretty Nellie Mason, his daughter, two yours a wife, three months a mother. "Don't he cross, pa," pleaded Nellie, "it's n pleasure to have Darrell's uaele even recognize us. It's broken the ice, anyway. I'oor lonesome old man, I suppose the lack of friends has soured him." "H'm! lie's n close-fisted old miser, mis-er, that's what Zekiel Crane Is!" snorted snort-ed Mr. Hanks and swung away, disgusted dis-gusted and indignant. Nellie smiled sweetly at a big wooden wood-en baby's savings hank standing on a little table in the corner of the room. That had been the delayed gift of her husband's uncle to little Ross-more, Ross-more, their child. Nellie's father had bought a gold charm for the little one and Nellie's mother had donated a pretty outfit ofTtrcsses and slips. That morning Uncle Zekiel had hobbled over from his farm with the bank. "Made it myself," he said quite proudly. "See a sort of imitation of my old granary, with a cupola on the top of it. There's the chimney to put the pennies In," and he produced two and they chinked down into the receptacle. re-ceptacle. "You must save all I give end by the time Rossmore is of age there'll be quite a tidy sum." And Nellie kissed the old man with sincere appreciation, for he had not if1 Old Uncle Zekiel's Handwork Was a Mass of Splinters. been to see them since their wedding. When her husband came home she led him to the bnnii. "Uncle Zekiel's present to baby," she said sweetly. . Darrell Mason's lips wrinkled nt the corner in a quizzical way. "A token of good will, anyway, dear," ke observed. "Don't get sour over his miserly ways. He means well. It's that cousin of his, Luke Dunbar, who has come to live with him since I left, that has kept Uncle away and made him stingy." "How, Darrell?" inquired Nellie, with wondering blue eyes. "Well, Dunbar is a schemer and Is after the old man's wealth. lie is a domineering fellow and somehow had got the old man under his thumb so that the poor old man is afraid to call his soul his own." "I don't see how that can be," murmured mur-mured Nellie. "Why, it seems that Dunbar's father fa-ther had a pretence of a claim to the old farm. It was thrown out of court twice, but the sou has made uncle believe that he can bring a new suit and harass him and put him to ex-. ex-. pense. Uncle has such a horror of the law that he has agreed, I understand, under-stand, to leave the farm to Dunbar when ho dies." "It should be yours, dear, as the nearest of kin," suggested Nellie. "Oh, I don't covet it," declared Darrell Dar-rell lightly. "It always was a hard-scrabble hard-scrabble tract. Besides, if Dunbar makes Uncle's last days less lonely let him reap the reward." "Hut I hear that Mr. Dunbar Is not a very good man," intimated Nellie mildly. "No, ho isn't, for a fact," declared her husband bluntly. "I hear that he watches Uncle closely so that he won't get rid of any stray cash, hoping to get that, too, when Uncle dies. I think that Is the reason why Uncle hasn't come over to see us more often. Lately, Late-ly, I learn, Dunbar has been carousing around the town drinking shops, so that probably gave Uncle the opportunity oppor-tunity to slip over and see us." This seemed to be true, for the very next day Mr. Crane put In a second appearance ap-pearance at the cottage. He was quite chipper and took baby Rossmore on his knee and chuckled over him, and then very ostentatiously dropped two more pennies into the bank. Then he missed two days, came regularly reg-ularly for a week, and then got down to a system of coming alternate mornings. morn-ings. Darrell ascertained that the days he missed were those when Dunbar Dun-bar stayed at home to recover from the carouse of the evening previous. Always the pennies were the contribution contri-bution of their visitor, and Uncle Zekiel used to get a card and pencil and figure out what two cents would amount to in twenty-one years. Then he would slap his thigh and chuckle and add : "Oh, there'll be quite enough to educate Rossmore, if I live long enoughand Dunbar lets me keep It up," he would add, with a' grim look of mystery, and, at times, malice on his face. Thus nearly two years passed away and one morning news came to the Mason home that Uncle Zekiel was dead. After the funeral a will was read that left the home to Dunbar. "And nothing left for you, dear!" sighed Nellie. "1 hear the farm was all there was left," advised Darrell. "Well, Uncle Zekiel had two years of pleasure In the company of Rossmore and I think he really loved the dear little fellow." In about a month Luke Dunbar had loft the village, a disgusted, disappointed disap-pointed man. The farm was a poor one. He might have secured a living from it and with care and work could have made it valuable, but he was a sluggard. slug-gard. He left town railing at "that old skinflint for spending alf his ready cash and leaving hiin a barren old waste !" It certainly was a mystery what had become of quite a sum Uncle Zekiel Ze-kiel had once kept at the bank. The extravagant habits of Dunbar were blamed for this, however. He put the farm in the hands of an agent to sell for what It would bring, boasting "one royal good time when he got hold of the ready cash 1" It was a year later when Nellie and Darrell came Into the house from weeding the garden. "That precious child ! whatever has he got hold of now?" exclaimed Nellie, as a banging, hammering sound echoed from the living room. "The Irreverent little rogue!" cried Darrell, as they came upon the young hopeful, Little Rossmore, on the floor, the old bank before him, a hammer in his hand. Old Uncle Zekiel's handwork was a mass of splinters. Scattered on the carpet were pennies by the tens and hundreds, but also numerous bits of clasely-folded paper. Darrell picked one up. lie unfolded it. "A hundred-dollar bill !" he announced. an-nounced. "Five hundred !" cried Nellie, as she unfolded another bank note. "How much?" she questioned, as Darrell had smoothed out nearly a hundred of those closely-folded bits of opulence. "Over fonr thousand dollars not counting the pennies," announced Darrell. Dar-rell. "Baby's fortune!" cried Nellie. "Oil, Darrell! don't you see? Dear lovable old Uncle Zekiel made a pretense of the pennies, and hit by bit, without exciting suspicions of that spendthrift Dunbar, put all his money in the baby's bank!" They employed the money judiciously judici-ously by purchasing the property Luke Dunbar was sacrificing and made a real farm and a happy home of It. |