“Yes, it will. Nobody could help liking
to find himself as big a man as he’ll be when
he comes back here. Besides, don’t you see,
it’s her way of making it up to him for not
liking him as much as he wants. You give up,
don’t you?”
“No,” he cried, with feeble violence,
“I don’t. She’ll find out some
things about herself when she sees him again.”
Minnie shook her head.
There was a sound of wheels; the buckboard drew up
at the gate, and Helen, returning from her evening’s
labor, jumped out lightly, and ran around to pat the
horses’ heads. “Thank you so much,
Mr. Willetts,” she said to the driver.
“I know you will handle the two delegates you
are to look after as well as you do the judge’s
team; and you ought to, you know, because the delegates
are men. You dears!” She stroked the sleek
necks of the colts and handed them bunches of grass.
Briscoe came out, and let the friendly animals nose
his shoulder as he looked gravely down on the piquant
face beside him in the dusk. “Young lady,”
he said, “go East. Wait till we get on to
Washington, and sit in the gallery, and see John Harkless
rise up in his place, and hear the Speaker say:
‘The Gentleman from Indiana!’ I know the
chills would go up and down my spine, and I guess
you’d feel pretty well paid for your day’s
work. I guess we all would.”
“Aren’t you tired, Helen?” asked
Minnie, coming to her in the darkness and clasping
her waist.
“Tired? No; I’m happy. Did you
ever see the stars so bright?”
THE TREACHERY OF H. FISBEE
An Indiana town may lie asleep a long time, but there
always comes a day when it wakes up; and Plattville
had wakened in August when the “Herald”
became a daily and Eph Watts struck oil. It was
then that history began to be made. The “Herald”
printed News, and the paper was sold every morning
at stands in all the towns in that section of the State.
Its circulation tripled. Parker talked of new
presses; two men were added to his staff, and a reporter
was brought from Rouen to join Mr. Fisbee. The
“Herald” boomed the oil-field; people
swarmed into town; the hotel was crowded; strangers
became no sensation whatever. A capitalist bought
the whole north side of the Square to erect new stores,
and the Carlow Bank began the construction of a new
bank building of Bedford stone on Main Street.
Then it was whispered, next affirmed, that the “Herald”
had succeeded in another of its enterprises, and Main
Street was to be asphalted. That was the end
of the “old days” of Plattville.
There was a man who had laid the foundation upon which
the new Plattville was to be built; he who, through
the quiet labor of years, had stamped his spirit upon
the people, as their own was stamped upon him; but
he lay sick in his friend’s house and did not
care. One day Meredith found him propped up in
bed, reading a letter—reading it listlessly,
and with a dull eye.
