The Mellette County pioneer. [volume] (Wood, Mellette County, S.D.) 19??-1971, 1922-01-06
CHAPTER 1.
Cousin Percy's Little Joke.

! suppose every one has had the eX,
perience of waking in the middle OF
the night to find everything perfectly
still and quiet and normal, and yet
with the impression persisting that
there had been q tremendous crash OF
some sort just before the waking
senses were alive enough to realize ii.
1t was some such razing jolt as this
that was given me on the morning
when l was called in, with the other
members Of the family, TO listen to the
reading of my grandfather's will.
But, first, however, to give some
idea of the conditions precedent, ms a
lawyer would say. My father-good.
easy-going, comfort-loving Dad
never owned what Grandfather Dud-
Fey. putsingthis thin lips and swapping
the words out, called "the money
sense" AS an architect high in his
profession and with fine artistic feel
Ing for the beautiful i'm buildings, he
earned a liberal income-and spent It f;
or so much of IL that there was barely
enough left after his death to provide
for my mother and sister, and to keep
me going, as you might say, I'm an ex-
ceedingly modest manner Without
work. l mean. | may as well confess,
mt once, that | had never acquired the
work habit. I was always ''going to-"
but It was so fatally easy to keep on
p%ostponing the chilling plunge. l sup
pose | had been ready on at least half
a dozen occasions to take a dive into
pool with a salary attachment;
but always some good friend would
bob up to say. "Oh. come on, Stannie,
old man.; we're lacking just one more
to make up the bunch. Don't be q
clam. Time enough to settle down
when you have to-" and then 1t would
be all of.
Besides, you see. there was always
Grandfather Jasper in the background.
He had msney-lashings of it, SO we
Mi believed; and 1t had been q family
understanding for years that he In
tended splitting the bulk of it, fifty
fifty. between my cousin Percy and
me. Before we go any farther, let me
set it down that Cousin Percy was
and is-all the seventeen different
kinds Of things that l am not. and
never wished to be; smooth. neat. we'll
groomed, a grind In college and n
perfect dear" with the girls, am
bilious as the very devil. and measur-
Ing his friends by the amount of ''pulI'
they might be able to exert In his be-
half; there you have him from the
crown OF his w~ell-brushed little head
to his patent-leather pumps.
you're q fright, Stannie," he would
say, in his carefully polished diplo-
matte manner-he had a billet in the
Department of State at Washington,
and was In training for the legation
service abroad-"yOu are a perfect
fright. Three whole years out of col
lege. and you haven't done a single.
solitary useful thing yet. When are
you going to begin? And. incidental
ly, how long are you going to keep
Lisette waitingY"
Oh, ord!-right there was another
knot In the tangle-Lisette. We had
agreed to agree-Lisette and I-some
six months or so In advance of Grand
Gather Jasper's death. and we were
both perfectly well assured. and had
assured each other u dozen times. that
my income from Dads estate wasn't
more than half big enough to marry
On. You see. 1t was this way: Lisette
was enc Of a family of four girls In a
mighty expensive household. and there
ssasn't anything to lean on on that
<lde &c the fence. Though, Of course,
We never discussed 1t brutality in SO
many words, we were waiting for that
Affy-asty Icos-in at the will which fam
sjy tradition declared had already been
drnvn ,.p. signed. sealed, witnessed
and prt away in cold storage; other
w,se In TIC s~afc-kecping Of GRANDPA
ther Jasper's family lawyer.
Al Of whicu may serve to bring VI