Chapter 4

"I'm not so sure about it being too expensive," replied Bob. "Mr. White said yesterday that it didn't matter so much what an improvement cost, if it could be made to pay the interest on the investment and earn a profit beside. All I need to know now to complete my figures is how much earth a man can dig and then I can tell how much it would cost."

"If you want to know so badly, Bob, why don't you take a pick and shovel and dig out a yard, and find out for yourself," suggested his grandmother.

"Yes," said his uncle, "then you'd know what a real backache feels like."

"All right," said Bob, "when may I do it?" turning to his uncle.

"Well, I suppose you might as well do it this morning as any time," said his uncle. "I know you won't be able to sleep to-night until you find out; besides, I'm going to town and you can have the forenoon off."

"That'll be fine, Uncle Joe," said Bob, "and there's another thing too, I wanted to ask you. I see wagons hauling sand and gravel from our pit. Who collects the money and how much do you charge them?"

"Charge a neighbor for a few loads of sand, Bob? What are you talking about? Of course not."

"But if you went to their farms, Uncle Joe, and asked for the rich soil out of their fields, they'd make you pay for it."

"Why, of course, Bob, but rich soil and sand and gravel are different. There's plenty of sand and gravel."

"Where, Uncle Joe?"

"Oh, everywhere."

"Then if that's so," said Bob, "why did Dan McCormick send his three wagons four miles to our pit last week? He said it was the nearest sand to his farm and what's more he said it's the only clean sand and gravel that don't need washing for fifteen miles around. I think we ought to charge them so much a yard."

"All right, Bob," said his uncle, whose mind was evidently occupied with things more important than selling sand. "You go ahead and make them pay, but remember, if you don't have any friends among your neighbors, don't blame me."

When his uncle returned from town a little after twelve o'clock, he drove down to see what Bob was doing, and found him at work on the ditch. As soon as Bob saw his uncle's face, he knew he had received his loan from Mr. White, for he was smiling and seemed to be very happy.

"Well, Bob, how are you making out?" he called cheerily, as he approached, looking at the excavated dirt thrown out. Then his eye caught a double line of stakes set at intervals and running the full length of the pond, marking out the two sides of the cut.

"I dug out one cubic yard in forty minutes, Uncle Joe, but we could do much better with a team of horses and a plow and scoop. Allowing thirty cents per hour, the ditch would cost eight hundred and forty dollars."

"Whee," said his uncle, "more than we could ever afford to pay, Bob, I'm afraid, even though Mr. White is in favor of it and agreed to-day to loan me whatever it would cost."

"Oh, then you told him about it?" said Bob. "How did he like the scheme?"

"He said it was a first-rate idea, Bob. He also said we should lay tile field drain through the bottom of the pond to the ditch every fifty feet over the entire field. These would soon drain the bottom and keep the new field dry."

"I've been wondering," said Bob, "what we could do about draining the bottom, but I didn't think of tile, although it sounds like a good idea."

And Bob took out his notebook and figured for a few minutes.

"If we put them fifty feet apart, that would mean twelve rows; each row would be six hundred feet long--that would mean 7200 lineal feet. Did Mr. White say what the tile would be worth a foot, laid, Uncle Joe?"

"No, he didn't, Bob, and I was too busy to ask him."

"What would you say, Uncle Joe," remarked Bob a few minutes later, "if I were to tell you we can get the ditch dug, a new dam built across between the two banks down by the beech trees, and a road cut up the west slope by the barn, so as to get rid of that steep hill, and we won't have to spend one cent."

"What nonsense are you talking?" demanded his uncle. "You just said it would cost eight hundred and forty dollars to dig the ditch alone."

"So it would, Uncle Joe, if we dug it by hand. We could probably do it quicker if we used a team of horses and scoop, but, of course, we'd have to allow for the value of the team while it was doing the work, and, besides, it would take too long."

"Well, then, how'd it be done?" asked his uncle, interested in spite of himself, for after his interview with the president of the First National that morning he began to look upon Bob as something more than a chore boy.

"Come over to the sand pit with me, Uncle Joe," he replied, "and I'll show you."

Together they walked over to the pit and the first thing that caught his uncle's eye was a large sign: Sand and Gravel for Sale Price 5oc per cu. yd. Cash or Labor Inquire Robert Williams

"Well, what does it mean?" asked his uncle, reading the sign for the second time.

"It means, Uncle Joe, that while I was still nailing up that sign two men came along in a big gray touring car and stopped, and one of them wanted to know what we'd take for the pit. I told him we sold our eggs by the dozen and not by what a hen might lay in a year. He laughed and said his name was Brady and that he had a contract for building some bridges for the new railroad that's coming in three miles down the creek and needed sand and gravel. The gentleman with him, who I judged from what they said was the engineer for the railroad, seemed to be very much pleased with the kind of sand and gravel we had, and I heard him tell Mr. Brady he'd approve it for the work. After looking the pit over, Mr. Brady asked what was meant by 'Cash or Labor,' so I told him we had some work we wanted done and would be willing to have him give us an estimate on the cost. He asked me what it was and I told him it was a ditch, a dam and a road. So he went up and looked the ditch over, then we went down to the beech trees and I explained to him about the new dam we were going to put in there to generate electric light for the farm. Then we rode up to the west slope in his big touring car and he examined the bank there. I showed him my figures for the ditch, and he made a memorandum of them; then he said if we would let him have the exclusive use of the sand pit for one year, taking out as much sand as he needed, and also let him have the heavy timbers from the old mill, as he needed them for some shoring he had to do, he would be willing to tear down the old mill, dig our ditch, build us a new dam and a new road, using his caterpillar steam shovel for the work."

"What did you say, Bob?" eagerly asked his uncle.

"I told him we couldn't think of it," replied Bob with a grin.

"What! You didn't take him up? What could you have been thinking of, Bob?"

"Well, you see, Uncle Joe, we'll need a lot of sand and gravel ourselves for making concrete fence posts and things like that, and then we may want to build a concrete road from the main road up to the barn, and, of course, we need a new dairy house and big silo."

"Yes, I know, Bob; the old place is pretty well run down," said his uncle. "Mr. White said something to-day about looking ahead and making permanent improvements, but we can't think of doing that now."

"I'm not so sure about that, Uncle Joe," replied Bob. "It seems we've got the only sand and gravel pit within fifteen miles with sand and gravel that the railroad engineer will accept for his work. I overheard him say that to Mr. Brady."

"Well, what did you finally do about the sand, Bob?" inquired his uncle eagerly.

"I told him the price was fifty cents per cubic yard in the pit, but we would let him pay for it in work, if his prices for the work were not too high, so he's going to make up a figure and come back and see us. I told him I thought you'd be willing to let him have the timber from the mill if he would take off the boards and two by fours and haul them over to the sand pit for us. You know, Uncle Joe, these will come in handy for us to build a shed when we start to make fence posts and other things there."

"But will he need enough sand to pay for all this work, Bob?" asked his uncle, now greatly excited.

"Yes, I'm sure he'll need more, for he seemed to be anxious to buy the pit outright."

"He did!"

"Yes, he did, but I told him we were not willing to sell it, Uncle Joe; that we expected to put up a lot of concrete buildings on the farm besides building some concrete roads and making a lot of concrete fence posts."

"Well, Bob, I guess you did a good half day's work all right," said his uncle, "and to show you that I appreciate the way you've handled this matter, I'll let you make the deal with Brady when he comes back."

They didn't have long to wait, for about three o'clock that afternoon a big gray touring car came snorting up the steep hill back of the barn and stopped near where they were loading manure. The driver of the car got out and came over to them.

"This is the Uncle Joe, I was telling you about, Mr. Brady," said Bob, by way of introduction, as the contractor came up to them.

"Glad to know you, Mr. Williams. I came up to see you about buying your sand pit. What will you take for it in cash? I haven't a great deal of time to lose, so I brought the money with me," and he drew from his pocket the largest roll of bills that Bob had ever seen in his life.

"You'll have to--to--talk it over with Bob," hesitated Bob's uncle, for at the sight of so much ready money he began to waver in his resolutions to let Bob handle the matter.

"We don't want to sell it, Mr. Brady," spoke up Bob quickly. "We want to control the pit ourselves and have sand and gravel for our own use."

"Oh, that's all right. I'll let you have all you want for your own use, free of cost, too," said Mr. Brady quickly.

"No," said Bob. "This is the only sand and gravel pit around here, and, when they start building concrete roads in this county, which they may do any time now, this pit will be valuable."

"Say, son," said the contractor, "you're wasting your time on a farm. You ought to be with me in the contracting business. Who's been telling you about this new county road work?"

"No one's been telling me," said Bob, "but everyone can see it doesn't pay to haul heavy loads over rough roads to market your crops, and as for farming," he added," it's a good business, too, Mr. Brady, especially if you have a good sand pit on the place," he added laughing.

"Well, son, let's get down to business. I see you're wise all right to the value of that pit. How much work do you want me to do and how much money will you want me to give you, and who's going to keep account of the sand we get and when do we settle for it?"

"You said you had a steam shovel, Mr. Brady," said Bob. "Is it busy now? We want to get this bottom land ready for corn this year."

"Not doing anything at the present time; can start your work next week for the shovel's on the railroad siding at Indiana now," he replied quickly.

"What do you charge a day for use of shovel with a man to operate it?" asked Bob.

"Hold on there, son; you'll get to be as smart as I am if you keep on at that rate. I don't rent the shovel by the day, but I'll tell you what: I'll do your work on contract."

"All right," said Bob. "How much do you want for digging the ditch?"

"$700," said Mr. Brady, consulting a memorandum.

"And how much for building the dam?"

"$200 without a concrete spillway and sluice gate and $350 more with them."

"And how much for the road up the west slope?"

"Well, that won't cost you much, son; that's an easier job than it looks. I'll charge you only $100 for doing that. That would make $1350 total."

"Yes," replied Bob, setting down the amount in his own memorandum book. "How much sand will you need, Mr. Brady?"

The contractor took a memorandum book from his pocket and consulted it for a moment.

"About ten to fifteen thousand yards of sand and gravel together on my first contract, but I expect to have a contract for building roads pretty soon that will require more than double that."

At the mention of these figures, Bob exchanged glances with his uncle, who had with difficulty kept to his agreement to let Bob make the bargain, and he fairly gasped when he began to realize the earning capacity of the old sand pit.

"I think you're charging me too much money, son, for the sand and gravel. You ought to knock off five or ten cents per yard and give me exclusive right to the pit."

"No," said Bob, "we're not willing to do that, but we will make this bargain with you, Mr. Brady: if you will do our work for us right away, we'll agree not to charge you more than fifty cents a cubic yard for as much sand and gravel as you want."

Seeing there was no other way out of the matter, the contractor finally consented to this arrangement.

"I'm not much on verbal contracts," he said, "for I find that people who do not set down in black and white what they agree to do, often forget and then there's trouble, so if you don't mind, Mr. Williams, we'll step into the house and put our agreement in writing."

"How shall we arrange to keep account of the amount of materials I get?" asked Mr. Brady, as they started for the house.

"How do you usually do?" asked Bob.

"I've got some tickets with my name on them," replied the contractor, "and every time a man takes away a load he gives one of those tickets to the man in charge of the pit. By the way, I suppose there'll be some one in charge who can take care of these tickets?"

"Yes," said Bob quickly, before his uncle had a chance to speak. "We're going to start a man making fence posts at the pit next week and you can give the tickets to him."

A few minutes after they had sat down at the table in the sitting room Mr. Brady handed the agreement to' Bob's uncle to read. He read it over and then handed it to Bob, who read it over twice, very careful, and then laid it down on the table.

"It reads all right, Mr. Brady, and seems to be just what we agreed to do," said Bob, "but before we sign it I'd like to show it to Mr. White, president of the First National Bank."

"All right, son, just as you like," said the contractor, a look of disappointment on his face as he put his fountain pen in his pocket. "I'll be here on Monday with my men and outfit, for I'm sure Mr. White will find the agreement is all right."

"I think it is myself," said Bob, "but I'd like to have him read it over anyway before it's signed."

As they walked out to the barnyard, where his car was standing, the contractor turned to Joe Williams and asked:

"How do you manage to get up and down that steep hill with your automobile, Mr. Williams?" "Oh, I don't have an automobile," Williams replied.

"What! no car?" exclaimed Mr. Brady. "I don't see how your women folks get along without one. Cars are so low and horses so high nowadays, it don't pay to take a horse out of a busy team to drive to town. I should think you couldn't do without one. Well, good day," he added, as he climbed into his car and threw on the self-starter. "See you next week."

VII

THE NEW AUNT

The following week was a very busy and eventful one for Bob. Plowing time was rapidly approaching, and his uncle was anxious to have all the manure placed on the fields ready to start work early; besides, they had taken a day off at Bob's urging to prune the young orchard. On Thursday he received a large package of Farm Bulletins from the Department of Agriculture at Washington, in reply to a postcard he had sent. He had only time for a hasty glance through them, before having to lay them away for careful reading later.

On Friday his uncle turned over the team to him, saying he was going to town for the day. Bob noticed that he had dressed up in his best clothes, so was not surprised when he came in from work late that afternoon to find they had company at the house.

"Come here, Bob," called his uncle cheerily, as he entered. "I want you to meet your new Aunt Bettie. She isn't exactly your aunt yet, but she will be soon."

Bob hastened forward to take the out stretched hand of the woman who rose to greet him.

Bob had a quick eye for beauty; he noted the fair, soft complexion which the rich dark hair set off so beautifully, but not this alone made the strong and conscious appeal to him--it was the frank manner with which she took his hand and the friendly light in her lovely brown eyes that won Bob completely.

"So this is 'Bob,' of whom you have been telling me," said Miss Atwood. "I'm certainly glad to make your acquaintance, Bob. Your Uncle Joe has been telling me many things about you, and I know we're going to be fast friends and have lots of fun together on the farm this summer."

"I hope so," said Bob, "for I like farming better than anything I know; there are so many interesting things to see and do."

"I'm glad to hear you say that, Bob," she replied. "In these days, when most boys of your age want to be in the town and cities, it's refreshing to find one who has vision enough to appreciate the golden opportunities of the country. Your Uncle Joe doesn't know it, but I've been doing considerable reading myself about farm life and farm work since we became engaged, and the more I read the more enthusiastic I become, and I'm sure we're going to have lots of pleasant days and evenings, too, together."

"Have you been reading farm bulletins, also, Aunt Bettie?" Bob asked hesitating, as he used her new title for the first time.

"That's right, I want you to call me 'Aunt Bettie'," she replied quickly, seeing his embarrassment. "Yes, I've gotten a great many bulletins from the Department of Agriculture at Washington and have read them over and over very carefully. The opportunities on a farm, if one just keeps his eyes open, are certainly wonderful."

"I'd like to read your bulletins, too," said Bob, his eyes sparkling.

"I thought you were going to give up teaching school, Bettie," interrupted her intended husband, "and here you and Bob are getting ready to start one. First thing you know, you'll be getting another scholar, one six feet tall," and he laughed down at her.

"Well, frankly, Joe," she replied, "you might spend your evenings less profitably than reading bulletins and other interesting papers on making farms pay."

"Guess I'll have to get in line," he replied laughing. "Bob's been preaching to me ever since he came here about modernizing the old farm and digging up our 'Hidden Treasure,' as he calls it."

"You'll have to excuse me now, Aunt Bettie," said Bob, "for it's milking time and I always plan to milk our cows regularly."

His heart was light and he whistled a merry tune as he started for the barn, the milk pails on his arm. He now felt sure that this summer was going to be the happiest one he had ever spent.

After the supper dishes had been cleared away, they sat together and talked of the things to be done to improve the farm and which would be the best crops to plant. As the discussion continued, Joe Williams began to realize that both Bettie and Bob knew many things about farming of which he was ignorant--things which, he reluctantly admitted to himself, were of the utmost importance.

On Saturday they quit work at noon to go to town. Bob asked his uncle if he were going to take Mr. Brady's contract and show it to Mr. White, the banker.

"The bank closes at noon on Saturdays, Bob," replied his uncle, "and we're to be pretty busy, Bettie and I, buying our things, for we're getting new furniture for the house, and I want to bring it back with me."

"Perhaps Mr. White doesn't go out of town on Saturday and I could find him at his home," said Bob. "I think we ought to have the matter settled before Mr. Brady gets here on Monday morning with his tools. It might make some difference if he started work before the agreement is signed."

"All right, Bob, you take the contract and try to find him. I'll be too busy loading the furniture to bother with it."

So as soon as he arrived in town, Bob left the wagon in front of the furniture store where his uncle, who had driven in with Miss Atwood in the buggy, was waiting. He hurried over to the First National Bank. The bank seemed to be closed, but the entrance door was unlocked, and after some time he found the banker in the directors' room going over some papers.

"Back already for your money, Bob?" laughed the banker, as he opened the door to admit him.

"No, Mr. White, I haven't yet found a better investment for the money. I came to see you about our sand pit. A Mr. Brady, who says he has the contract to build some bridges for the new railroad, wants to buy our sand and we have made a bargain with him and he put it in writing. We didn't sign it, for while it seems to be all right, Uncle Joe would like to have you look it over first."

"Oh, indeed," replied the banker, "and whose idea was it that I should read the contract before signing?"

"Well," hesitated Bob, "we thought maybe it would be better to be sure it was all right since you're loaning Uncle Joe money for the farm."

"That's right, Bob; that's only fair. Follow out that principle and you'll always get along."

He took the paper and read it through carefully and laid it down. Then he reflected a moment, picked it up and read it again. Then he whistled softly.

"You're right, Bob, in bringing this to me," he said, tapping the top of the table thoughtfully with the end of his pencil. "That contract is very well written.

"You see, Bob," said the banker, laying the document on the table, "this contract would be all right if you were sure you had enough sand and gravel to supply Mr. Brady's wants, but you will notice that he does not specify how much material he expected to use, nor does he state when he will require it, and if he took a notion to measure all the sand you have in the pit and issue a receipt for it, he could take it and let it lie on your ground for re-sale; he could do that under this agreement. Also, if you didn't have as much material as he wanted, he could compel you to supply him from other sources at the rate of fifty cents a yard."

"Well, what had we better do about it, Mr. White?" inquired Bob. "Mr. Brady's going to go to work on the ditch on Monday morning. He's setting up his caterpillar steam shovel now and getting ready."

"Wait a moment," said the banker, as he pressed the button. "I'll see if my stenographer has gone. She usually leaves at noon, but to-day I had some extra work that she stayed to finish--no, here she comes-- we'll have it re-written."

"Will you kindly make two copies of this agreement, Miss Brown?" asked the banker.

"You see, Bob, there should always be two copies of all agreements-- one fer yourself and one for the other party to the contract. It is always best to have all agreements in duplicate."

"You see, Bob," said the banker, as he finished dictating, "I've added a time limit to the contract. A year from now, when I hope they will begin making concrete county roads, your sand and gravel, if the supply holds out, ought to be worth at least $1.00 per cubic yard."

"I had no idea sand and gravel were so valuable" said Bob.

"Well, I've been looking the matter up a bit lately," replied the banker, "and I wouldn't be surprised if you could get that price for it a year from now--maybe before that even. There isn't a great deal of good sand and gravel in the entire county--certainly none that is as good as yours. If you've something else you'd like to do, Bob, you may stop around in an hour or so and get these contracts. I'll read them over after Miss Brown has them finished, and put my O. K. on them. I may not be here when you return."