At the words, “In the old church-yard by the orchard, Ben Bolt, In the valley so sweet and so low,” the old man bent over his cane, and great tears again ran down his cheeks. “I used to sing, Susan, and play the violin in the old house at home. Father made me promise not to take _that_ with me. He said it would hinder me. He meant well.” Susan sang: “But of all the boys that were schoolmates then, There is left but you and me.” Then there fell a silence, and the western twilight deepened, and the walls of the sun seemed melting down. “Thank you, my girl. That reminds me of the old times and the last song of the robin.” They sat in silence, save that the west winds rustled amid the withering leaves of the old cottonwoods. * * * * * One cool day in September Susan alighted from her horse after a long ride over the prairie. She was met at the door by her grandfather. “I’ve brought you another letter from the old home,” she said. “It is in aunt’s hand, and I think that she is in very great trouble. See! it is blotted.” The old man put on his spectacles, and held the letter close to his eyes. “Yes, she is in trouble, you may depend. I knew how it would be. Her hand shook when she wrote that. Let me open it.” He sat down on the rude piazza and read the letter, rocking at times nervously. “Yes, she is in deep trouble, sure enough, Susan. We must go. I haven’t done just right, Susan, by your aunt; I haven’t, now. When I was young, I used to climb trees, and so hide from her and leave her, and she used to cry. I can see her now. I do feel as though I had been climbing a tree all of my life and hiding and leaving her. It didn’t add to the stature of Zaccheus to climb a tree, but it did add to his reputation. So it is with me, Susan. I’ve gained some property by immigrating here to the prairies, but I am Zaccheus still, and I hear a voice calling me to come down. That’s the way we used to talk in the old New England times, in figures like, when I thought the tree-tops reached clear up to the sky.” “What does aunt write, grandpa?” “The old place is going to be sold by vendue, and the debts will take all—all.” “What is a vendue?” “Oh, it’s like this. When property people lose almost all they have, and can’t pay their mortgages, then comes the sheriff, and after him a man whom we call an auctioneer, and the auctioneer cries ‘Going, going, gone,’ and when he gets through there’s not so much as a birch broom left.” The old man rocked uneasily.