A Cousin's Conspiracy: or, A Boy's Struggle for an Inheritance. Horatio Alger Jr.

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      “What is my uncle’s name?”

      “Stephen Ray. He lives a few miles from Elmira on the Erie Road.”

      “And is he quite rich?”

      “Yes; he is probably worth a quarter of a million dollars. It is money which should have gone to your father.”

      “Then the wicked are sometimes prospered in this world?”

      “Yes, but this world is not all.”

      “Has there been any communication with my cousin in all these years?”

      “Yes; two years ago I wrote to him.”

      “What did you write?”

      “You must forgive me, Ernest, but I saw you growing up without education, and I felt that you should have advantages which I could not give you. I wrote to your cousin, asking if he would pay your expenses in a preparatory school and afterwards at college.”

      “What did he reply?”

      “Go to the trunk. You will find his letter there. It is in the tray, and addressed to me.”

      Ernest found it readily.

      “May I read it?” he asked.

      “Yes, I wish you to do so.”

      It ran thus:

      Ernest read this letter with flushed cheeks.

      “I hate that man!” he said hotly, “even if he is a relative. Peter, I am sorry you ever applied to him in my behalf.”

      “I would not, Ernest, if I had understood what manner of man he was.”

      “I may meet him some time,” said Ernest thoughtfully.

      “Would you claim relationship?”

      “Never!” declared Ernest emphatically. “It was he, you say, who prejudiced my grandfather against my poor father.”

      “Yes.”

      “In order to secure the estate himself?”

      “Undoubtedly that was his object.”

      “Nothing could be meaner. I would rather live poor all my life than get property by such means.”

      “If you have no more questions to ask, Ernest, I will try to sleep. I feel drowsy.”

      “Do so, Uncle Peter.”

      The old man closed his eyes, and soon all was silent. Ernest himself lay down on a small bed. When he awoke, hours afterward, he lit a candle and went to Peter’s bedside.

      The old man lay still. With quick suspicion Ernest placed his hand on his cheek.

      It was stone cold.

      “He is dead!” cried Ernest, and a feeling of desolation came over him.

      “I am all alone now,” he murmured.

      But he was not wholly alone. There was a face glued against the window-pane – a face that he did not see. It was the tramp he had met during the day at the village store.

      CHAPTER III

      ROBBERY

      The tramp stood with his face glued to the pane, looking in at the boy. He could not quite understand what had taken place, but gathered that the old man was dead.

      “So much the better!” he said. “It will make my task easier.”

      He had hoped to find both asleep, and decided to wait near the house till the boy went to bed. He had made many inquiries at the store of Joe Marks, and the answers led him to believe that old Peter had a large amount of money concealed in his cabin.

      Now Tom Burns was a penniless tramp, who had wandered from Chicago on a predatory trip, to take any property he could lay his hands on. The chance that presented itself here was tempting to a man of his character.

      Earlier in the evening he had reached the cabin, but thought it best to defer his work until later, for Ernest was awake and stirring about the room.

      The tramp withdrew from the cabin and lay down under a tree, where he was soon fast asleep. Curiously it was the very oak tree under which Peter’s little hoard was concealed. This of course he did not know. Had he been aware that directly beneath him was a box containing a hundred dollars in gold he would have been electrified and full of joy.

      Tom Burns in his long and varied career had many times slept in the open air, and he had no difficulty in falling asleep now, and when he woke it was much later than he intended. However, without delay, he made his way to the cabin, and arrived just as Ernest discovered the death of the old man whom he had supposed to be his uncle.

      What time it was the tramp did not know, but as he stood with his face glued to the window-pane he heard a clock in the cabin striking the hour of three.

      “Three o’clock,” he ejaculated. “Well, I did have a nap!”

      The boy was awake, and he thought it best to wait a while.

      “Why didn’t I get here a little sooner?” he grumbled. “Then I could have ransacked the cabin without trouble. Probably the old man has been dead some time.”

      He watched to see what Ernest would do.

      “He won’t be such a fool as to sit up with the corpse,” he muttered a little apprehensively. “That wouldn’t do no good.”

      Apparently Ernest was of this opinion, for after carefully covering up the inanimate body he lay down again on his own bed.

      He did not fall asleep immediately, for the thought that he was in the presence of death naturally affected his imagination. But gradually his eyes closed, and his full, regular breathing gave notice that he was asleep.

      He had left the candle burning on the table. By the light which it afforded the tramp could watch him, and at the end of twenty СКАЧАТЬ