He was thinking what he should do. Had the question of his right to
retain and make use of that paper been squarely offered to him an hour
ago, he would without doubt have decided that he ought not to keep it.
Even now, looking at it as an abstract principle, he did not deceive
himself in the least. But Nature has the reprehensible habit of
not presenting these questions to us squarely and fairly, and it is
remarkable that in most of our offending the abstract principle is never
the direct issue. Mr. Harkutt was conscious of having been unwillingly
led step by step into a difficult, not to say dishonest, situation,
and against his own seeking. He had never asked Elijah to sell him the
property; he had distinctly declined it; it had even been forced upon
him as security for the pittance he so freely gave him. This proved (to
himself) that he himself was honest; it was only the circumstances that
were queer. Of course if Elijah had lived, he, Harkutt, might have tried
to drive some bargain with him before the news of the railroad survey
came out--for THAT was only business. But now that Elijah was dead, who
would be a penny the worse or better but himself if he chose to consider
the whole thing as a lucky speculation, and his gift of five dollars as
the price he paid for it? Nobody could think that he had calculated upon
'Lige's suicide, any more than that the property would become valuable.
In fact if it came to that, if 'Lige had really contemplated killing
himself as a hopeless bankrupt after taking Harkutt's money as a loan,
it was a swindle on his--Harkutt's--good-nature. He worked himself into
a rage, which he felt was innately virtuous, at this tyranny of cold
principle over his own warm-hearted instincts, but if it came to the
LAW, he'd stand by law and not sentiment. He'd just let them--by
which he vaguely meant the world, Tasajara, and possibly his own
conscience--see that he wasn't a sentimental fool, and he'd freeze on to
that paper and that property!