Do and Dare — a Brave Boy's Fight for Fortune

“This morning, sir.”

“Have you seen anything of my son, Eben, here?” gasped Mr. Graham.

“Yes, sir; he was on the same train, but I did not see him to speak to him till after I reached the city.”

“Do you know what he has been doing here?” asked Ebenezer, his face haggard with anxiety.

“I only saw him for five minutes,” answered Herbert, reluctant to tell the father what he knew would confirm any suspicion he might entertain.

“Where did you see him?” demanded Ebenezer, quickly.

“At a railroad ticket office not far from the Old South Church.”

“Do you know if he bought any ticket?” asked Ebenezer, anxiously.

“Yes,” answered Herbert. “I overheard him purchasing a ticket to Chicago.”

Ebenezer groaned, and his face seemed more and more wizened and puckered up.

“It is as I thought!” he exclaimed, bitterly. “My own son has robbed me and fled like a thief, as he is.”

Herbert was shocked, but not surprised. He didn’t like to ask particulars, but Ebenezer volunteered them.

“This morning,” he said, “I foolishly gave Eben a hundred dollars, and sent him to Boston to pay for a bill of goods which I recently bought of a wholesale house on Milk Street. If I had only known you were going in, I would have sent it by you.”

Herbert felt gratified at this manifestation of confidence, especially as he had so recently been charged with robbing the post office, but did not interrupt Mr. Graham, who continued:

“As soon as Eben was fairly gone, I began to feel sorry I sent him, for he got into extravagant ways when he was in Boston before, and he had been teasing me to give him money enough to go out West with. About noon I discovered that he had taken fifty dollars more than the amount I intrusted to him, and then I couldn’t rest till I was on my way to Boston to find out the worst. I went to the house on Milk Street and found they had seen nothing of Eben. Then I knew what had happened. The graceless boy has robbed his father of a hundred and fifty dollars, and is probably on his way West by this time.”

“He was to start by the three o’clock train, I think,” said Herbert, and gave his reasons for thinking so.

Ebenezer seemed so utterly cast down by this confirmation of his worst suspicions, that Herbert called Mr. Melville, thinking he might be able to say something to comfort him.

CHAPTER XIX. EBENEZER GRAHAM’S GRIEF

“How much have you lost by your son, Mr. Graham?” asked George Melville.

“Nearly two hundred and fifty dollars,” groaned Ebenezer, “counting what I paid in the city to his creditors, it is terrible, terrible!” and he wrung his hands in his bitterness of spirit.

“I am sorry for you,” said Melville, “and still more for him.”

“Why should you be sorry for him?” demanded Ebenezer, sharply. “He hasn’t lost anything.”

“Is it nothing to lose his consciousness of integrity, to leave his home knowing that he is a thief?”

“Little he’ll care for that!” said Mr. Graham, shrugging his shoulders. “He’s laughing in his sleeve, most likely, at the way he has duped and cheated me, his father.”

“How old is Eben, Mr. Graham?”

“He will be twenty in November,” answered Ebenezer, apparently puzzled by the question.

“Then, as he is so young, let us hope that he may see the error of his ways, and repent.”

“That won’t bring me back my money,” objected Ebenezer, querulously. It was clear that he thought more of the money he had lost than of his son’s lack of principle.

“No, it will not give you back your money, but it may give you back a son purified and prepared to take an honorable position in society.”

“No, no; he’s bad, bad!” said the stricken father. “What did he care for the labor and toil it took to save up that money?”

“I hope the loss of the money will not distress you, Mr. Graham.”

“Well, no, not exactly,” said Ebenezer, hesitating. “I shall have to take some money from the savings bank to make up what that graceless boy has stolen.”

It was clear that Ebenezer Graham would not have to go to the poorhouse in consequence of his losses.

“I can hardly offer you consolation,” said George Melville, “but I suspect that you will not be called upon to pay any more money for your son.”

“I don’t mean to!” said Ebenezer, grimly.

“Going away as he has done, he will find it necessary to support himself, and will hardly have courage to send to you for assistance.”

“Let him try it!” said Ebenezer, his eyes snapping.

“He may, therefore, being thrown upon his own resources, be compelled to work hard, and that will probably be the best thing that can happen to him.”

“I hope he will! I hope he will!” said the storekeeper. “He may find out after a while that he had an easy time at home, and was better paid than he will be among strangers. I won’t pay any more of his debts. I’ll publish a notice saying that I have given him his time, and won’t pay any more debts of his contracting. He might run into debt enough to ruin me, between now and the time he becomes of age.”

George Melville considered that the storekeeper was justified in taking this step, and said so.

While they were on the train, Ebenezer got measurably reconciled to his loss, and his busy brain began to calculate how much money he would save by ceasing to be responsible for Eben’s expenses of living and prospective debts. Without this drawback, he knew he would grow richer every year. He knew also that notwithstanding the sum it had just cost him, he would be better off at the end of the year than the beginning, and to a man of his character this was perhaps the best form of consolation that he could have.

Suddenly it occurred to Mr. Graham that he should need a clerk in place of his son.

“Now that Eben has gone, Herbert,” he said, “I am ready to take you back.”

This was a surprise, for Herbert had not thought of the effect upon his own business prospects.

“I have got a place, thank you, Mr. Graham,” he said.

“You don’t call trampin’ round huntin’ and fishin’ work, do you?” said Ebenezer.

“It is very agreeable work, sir.”

“But it stands to reason that you can’t earn much that way. I wouldn’t give you twenty-five cents a week for such doings.”

“Are you willing to pay me more than Mr. Melville does?” asked Herbert, demurely, smiling to himself.

“How much does he pay you now?” asked Ebenezer, cautiously.