Real Folks by A. D. T. (Adeline Dutton Train) Whitney
page 48 of 356 (13%)
page 48 of 356 (13%)
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worn, and nobody would notice it, lying on the table there, with an
almanac, a directory, the big, open Worcester's Dictionary, and the scattered pamphlets and newspapers of the day. Out in the world, Titus Oldways went about with visor down. He gave to no fairs nor public charities; "let them get all they could that way, it wasn't his way," he said to Rachel Froke. The world thought he gave nothing, either of purse or life. There was a plan they had together,--he and Marmaduke Wharne,--this girls' story-book will not hold the details nor the idea of it,--about a farm they owned, and people working it that could go nowhere else to work anything; and a mill-privilege that might be utilized and expanded, to make--not money so much as safe and honest human life by way of making money; and they sat and talked this plan over, and settled its arrangements, in the days that Marmaduke Wharne was staying on in Boston, waiting for his other friend, Miss Craydocke, who had taken the River Road down from Outledge, and so come round by Z----, where she was staying a few days with the Goldthwaites and the Inglesides. Miss Craydocke had a share or two in the farm and in the mill. And now, Titus Oldways wanted to know of Marmaduke Wharne what he was to do for Afterwards. It was a question that had puzzled and troubled him. Afterwards. "While I live," he said, "I will do what I can, and _as_ I can. I will hand over my doing, and the wherewith, to no society or |
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