|IT WAS not the only adventure that the School-teacher was destined to
meet with on this day. As he was returning along the mountain road, with
the little boy on his shoulder, at the first ascent, beyond the river
crossing, he met two men in a buckboard. The horses were gaunt as from
hard usage. The man who drove them was known to the School-teacher. The
other was a big man with a heavy black beard. He sat leaning over in the
buckboard. His head down. His shoulders rising in a hump. He had gone
stooped for so long that the hump on his shoulders was now a sort of
permanent deformity.
They drew up by the roadside as the School-teacher approached. The big,
hump-shouldered man spoke, without taking the trouble to preface his
remarks with any form of salutation.
“Do you claim old Nicholas Parks' estate?”
The School-teacher regarded him with his deep, tranquil, gray-blue eyes.
“It belongs to my father,” he said.
“Is your father related to old Nicholas?”
“No.”
“Has he got a deed from old Nicholas?”
“No.”
“Then how does he claim under him?”
“He does not claim under him. Nicholas Parks had his possession from my
father.”
“You mean that your father owned it first?”
“Yes.”
“Did he sell to Nicholas?”
“No.”
“Then how did old Nicholas come to own it?”
“He never owned it; my father permitted him to use it.”
“Then your claim is that old Nicholas was just a tenant for life.”
“Yes,” replied the School-teacher, “that was it, a tenant for life.”
“Did your father give Nicholas any writing?”
“No.”
“Did Nicholas pay anything for the use of the land?”
“No.”
“Did he ever recognize your father's title while he was living?”
“No.”
“Then he never knew that your father owned these lands?”
“Yes,” replied the School-teacher, “in the end he knew it.”
“How did he know it, if he did not find it out while he was living?”
“He found it out while he was dying,” replied the School-teacher.
The big humpback looked out sidewise at the man standing in the road,
with the child on his shoulder, its little arm around his neck, its
little fingers on his face.
“Didn't you come into these mountains about the time that old Nicholas
died?”
“On the very day that he died,” replied the School-teacher.
“I see,” said the humpback, “then he found it out through you.”
“No, man,” replied the School-teacher, “ever finds out anything about
the affairs of my father except he find it out through me.”
“Then you're here to look after your father's business?”
“Yes,” replied the School-teacher, “that is it, I am here to look after
my father's business.”
“An' so you moved in when old Nicholas died?”
“Yes.”
“I see,” said the humpback, “now I want to ask you another question.
These lands belonged to the state. Old Nicholas bought from the state,
and the state made him a deed. Do you contend that your father's title
is older than that of the state?”
“Yes.”
The humpback compressed the muscles of his mouth and nodded his head
slowly.
“I see,” he said, “your father claims the lands of Nicholas Parks under
some old patent that gives him a color of title and he has sent you
here to get into possession. A color of title is not good at law without
possession. Well, I can tell you, the state's not going to lie by and
allow you to acquire adverse possession. Old Nicholas Parks died without
heirs, and, by the law, his property escheats to the state. So you can
make up your mind to get off.”
He reached over, caught the whip out of its socket, and struck the
horses. They jumped and the buckboard went clattering down the mountain,
the wheels bouncing on the stones.
The little boy raised his hand and pointed his tiny finger at the
departing horses.
“Man hurt gups,” he said.
The School-teacher stood in the road watching the humpback lash the
half-starved team. His face was full of misery.