Windy McPherson's Son

fields, and had stumbled through the streets in the bleak darkness of winter mornings, when the trains from the north came into Caxton covered with ice, and the trainmen sto

wobbly Windy had provided, grew and influenced his thoughts and his acts. Tirelessly he kept at his efforts to get ahead. In his bed at night he dreamed of dollars. Jane McPherson had herself a passion for frugality. In spite of Windy's incompetence and her own growing ill health, she would not permit the family to go into debt, and although, in the long hard winters, Sam sometimes ate cornm

d of reverence as banker Walker, fat, sleek, and pr

, the boy was uncertain. The man followed wit

ry, pointed out hesitatingly that the papers took account of men of wealth no matter what their achievements, "

to the schools and who predicted that the day would come when Sam would regret his lack of book lear

aper selling even after attaining the stature of a man, was a favourite. Sitting in chairs

for a live youn

city and, listening to them, he saw the great ways filled with hurrying people, the tall buildings touching the sky, the men running about intent upon money-making, and th

ing out of nothing, had he not systematised and monopolised the selling of papers, had he not introduced the vending of popcorn and peanuts from baskets to the Saturday night crowds? Already b

own here," he declared in his pride

farmers, and the labourers dressed in their Sunday best and came forth to mingle with their fellows. On Main Street crowds packed the stores, the sidewalks, and drinking places, and men stood about in groups talking while young girls with their lovers walked up and down. I

the crowd Sam went,

ds of a slow-thinking farmer. "Recipes for cooking new dishes," he urged to the f

w, and the last roisterer had driven off into the darkness carryin

y night that he decided

eedom Smith, stopping him as he hurried by. "You are

not stop to discuss the matter with Freedom, but for a year he had been looking q

and who had heard the offer. "A boy, who has seen the secret workings of my mind, who has heard me spo

en back of his house, Telfer talk

t money-making in the first place. It is only women and fools who despise money-making. Look at Eleanor here. The time and thought she puts into the selling of hats would be the death of me, but it has been the

of his excess of words, glanced from the woman to the boy. He knew that the suggestion regarding a child had touched a secret regret in Eleanor, and began t

s one of the virtues that proves man not a savage. It has lifted him up-not money-making, but the power to make money. Money makes life livable. It gives freedom and destroys fear. Ha

e drunken men who beat and starve their families, the grim silences of the crowded, unsanitary houses of the poor, the inefficient, and the defeated? Go sit around the lounging room of the most vapid rich man's city club as I have done, and then sit among the workers of a factory at the n

away by the wind of his eloquence Telfer for

nd the really great artists have it. In books and stories the great men starve in garrets. In real life they are more likely to ride in carriages on Fifth Avenue and have country places on the Hudson.

d a chance at it. In the buying of potatoes, butter, eggs, apples, and hides he thought he could make money, also, he knew that the dogged pers

Two boys bought the business, backed by their fathers. A talk in the back room of the bank, with the cashier telling of Sam's record as a depositor, and the seven hundred dollars surplus clinched the deal. When it came to the deal with Freedom, Sam to

on the other hand was to furnish horse, vehicle, and keep for the horse, while Sam was to take care of the horse. The prices to be paid for the things bought were to be fixed each morning by Free

t him in the grocery asking him not to shed rebel blood in the sugar barrel. He drove about the country in a low phaeton buggy that rattled and squeaked enormously and had a wide rip in the top. To Sam's knowledge neither the buggy nor Freedom were washed during his stay with the man. He had a method o

ersonally. He knew this and would stand on his front porch laughing and roaring about it. "Good morning, Mary," he would shout at the neat German

office and got practicall

engine, a mowing machine, several farm wagons and other farm tools gone beyond naming. Every few days he came home bringing a new prize. They overflowed the yard and crept onto the porch. Sam never knew him to sell any of this stuff. He had at one time sixteen sets of ha

rd-working Sam and occasionally stood at the back door and talked with him in a low, even voice at evening a

s a buyer by instinct, working a wide stretch of country very systematic

hen called them sharply to accounts, and before they had recovered from their confusion drove home the bargain. In Sam's day, farmers did not watch the daily market reports, in fact, the markets were not systematised and regulat

g ability that developed in the boy and roared his name up and down

ot in that boy," he would sho

carefully and bought potatoes and apples, butter and eggs, furs and hides, with untiring zeal, working always to swell his commissions. Freedom took the risks in the busines

m came into the stable where Sam st

his voice. He had written to the Chicago firm to whom he sold most of the things he bought, telling of Sam and his ability, and th

s chance in the city. Only that morning old Doctor Harkness had stopped him at the door as he set out for work and, pointing over his shoulder with his thumb to where in the house his mother lay, wasted an

r and hung the harness he had taken

ad to go," he

e did not want to lose Sam. He had written the Chicago company because of his affection for the boy and because he believed him capable of something

nothing Sam turned and hurried off up the street, Freedom and his wife walked to the front gate and watched him go. From a street corner, where he stopped in the sh