"It's
all settled, Babe, and the claim is to stand in your name. Everything is
attended to but the legal signatures before a notary. I was glad my money
was in the all-night bank, because I was not compelled to wait until
Monday to get it for young Calvert. You will have the relinquishment of
his right to the claim, Babe, and a small adobe house with sheds and
yards and a good spring of living water. In building up the place into a
profitable investment you will be building up your health, which is the
first and greatest consideration. I--you must not go the way your mother
went. You will not, because you will live in the open and throw off
the--ah--incipient--"
"Dad--_Stevenson_!" Helen May was sitting with her arms lying loose in
her lap, palms upward. Her lips had been loose and parted a little with
the slackness of blank amazement. In those first awful minutes she really
believed that her father had suddenly lost his mind; that he was joking
never occurred to her. Peter was not gifted with any sense of humor
whatsoever, and Helen May knew it as she knew the color of his hair.
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