Uncle Job still lived in his plain little cottage with his wife and daughter, and still plied his humble task as the village cobbler, essaying sometimes to make shoes when there were none to be repaired. There was a plat of land belonging to his house rather more than an acre in extent, but land was cheap in Hampton, and it is doubtful whether both house and lot would have brought, if thrown into the market, over one thousand dollars. Uncle Job had at one time about a hundred dollars in the savings bank in a neighboring town--a fund to draw from in an emergency--and this money with his plain home constituted his entire wealth.

 

Eleven hundred dollars all told! It was not a very brilliant result for forty years' labor, beginning with the days of his boyhood; but Job Stanton was not ambitious, and he actually felt well-to-do. He earned enough to supply the simple wants of his family, and had something over, and this satisfied him.

 

But one day a strong temptation came to Job Stanton, and he yielded to it.

 

A trader came riding over from a neighboring town and called on Uncle Job. The good man thought he had come to order a new pair of shoes, and felt flattered that such a dashing man should have gone so far out of his way to patronize him.

 

"I'm glad to see you, Mr. Richmond," he said. "Won't you set down?"

 

He should have said _sit_, but Job Stanton's educational advantages had been very limited.

 

"I don't care if I do. Snug place you've got here, Mr. Stanton."

 

"It's very plain and humble, but it's home, and I set by it," answered Job, who was busily engaged in tapping a shoe belonging to Eliphalet Nourza, a farm-laborer.

 

"I've come over to see you on a little business, Mr. Stanton," said the trader, affably.

 

"Jest so!" returned Uncle Job cheerfully, glancing over his spectacles at the trader's shoes to see if they looked much worn. "Want a pair of new shoes, I reckon?"

 

"I shall need a new pair soon," said Richmond, "but that isn't exactly what I meant."

 

It flashed across Job Stanton's mind that his visitor might be going to make him an offer for the old place, but he felt that he could not bear to part with it. He had lived there ever since he was married, thirty-five years ago, and there Jennie, the child of his old age, had been born.

 

But the trader's next sentence relieved him of this thought.

 

"The fact is, Uncle Job," proceeded the trader, adopting the title by which the shoemaker was generally known in Hampton, "I've got a favor to ask of you."

 

"'A favor to ask of me'?" repeated Job, looking up with some surprise at the well-dressed merchant, who seemed by his presence to honor the homely little shop.

 

"Yes," continued Richmond, with gravity; "I want you to indorse my note for five hundred dollars."

 

"What made you come to me?" asked Job Stanton in surprise. "I am not a capitalist; I am a poor man."

 

"Oh, well, you're good for five hundred dollars."

 

"Yes," answered Job with some complacency; "my place here is worth twice that, let alone the money I've got in the savings bank."

 

"Of course it is."

 

"Still, I don't want to run no risk. You'd better go to some moneyed man--like Major Sturgis, for instance."

 

"Why, the fact is, Uncle Job, it's the major that lets me have the money on my note, but he stipulated that I should have an indorser, and he particularly mentioned you."

 

"That's cur'us!" said Job. "Why should he think of me?"

 

"Oh, he knew you were a reliable man."

 

"How does it happen that you need money?" asked Job, bluntly. "Isn't your business good?"

 

"That's just it," said Richmond, glibly. "It's so good that I've got to extend my stock, and that takes money. I'm turning money over all the time, and it won't be long before I am able to retire."

 

"I'm glad of that, but I don't quite understand, if that's so, why you're short of funds."

 

"It's clear you are not a business-man," said Richmond, laughing, "but I think I can explain to you ............