CHAPTER XI 

AT AUCTION 

Jimmy went back to the ranch beside the Fraser once, but Jordan went without him several times, for Forster apparently found his company congenial. It happened that he contrived to see a good deal of Eleanor Wheelock during his visits, but neither of them mentioned this to Jimmy, who, indeed, would probably have concerned himself little about it had he heard of it, since he had other things to think about just then. Merril had sent his father a formal notice that unless the money due should be paid by a certain time, the schooner would be sold as stipulated in the bond, and, though Tom Wheelock had expected nothing else, he apparently collapsed altogether under the final blow. 

Jordan, who had just come back from Forster's ranch, arrived on board the _Tyee_ while the doctor was talking to Jimmy, and, strolling forward, he sat down on the windlass and commenced a conversation with Prescott, with whom he had promptly made friends. In the meanwhile, Jimmy looked at the doctor a trifle wearily as he leaned on the rail. 

"Perhaps my mind's not as clear as usual to-day, but these scientific terms don't convey very much to me," he said. 

"In plain English, then," said the doctor, "it is general break-down your father is suffering from, though it is intensified by a partial loss of control over the muscles on one side of him. The latter trouble is, perhaps, the result of what one might call constitutional causes, but, as you seem to fancy, worry and nervous strain, or a shock of any kind, may have accelerated it or brought about the climax." 
What might get sold?
the schooner would be sold 